During the "Twelfth Five-Year Plan" period, the rapid development of the national economy, especially the prosperity of the automobile industry and the communication industry, brought great development space for the die-casting industry. During this period, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology's “Directives for Independent Innovation and Guidance for Major Technical Equipment (2012 Edition)” promoted the overall automation level of the die-casting industry.
In 2017, China's non-ferrous metal die-casting industry entered a new era of development. With the release of “Made in China 2025” and “National 13th Five-Year Plan”, smart manufacturing, innovation-driven and information-intelligence have become a major issue facing traditional manufacturing. At present, the production level of China's die-casting industry is generally at the level of semi-automation and automation. Die-casting production is a highly efficient production method. It is one of the modern manufacturing methods. To fully exploit the advantages of die-casting production, it is necessary to achieve industrial upgrading from the level of automated production. Towards a digital and intelligent production level.
As a high-efficiency production method, die-casting production must ensure the high efficiency of production on the one hand, and ensure the stability of production efficiency and product quality on the other hand, which manages and monitors various production factors in the production process, and interconnects these information and shared.
Digitization of die-casting production means digitizing from the aspects of product mold design, raw material supply, production monitoring, quality monitoring, and finished product warehouse management, and interconnecting and sharing these digitized information. The information generated by all aspects is collected into the production management system (MES), which then masters the production status based on these real-time data, and efficiently and reasonably dispatches and arranges production. Accurately meet the customer's order requirements, and ultimately achieve high efficiency and efficiency of the company's operations.
If the digitalization of die-casting production is extended to the company's supplier management and customer management, product life cycle management (PLM) can be realized. Further extending to cost management and warehouse management, and the company's ERP system docking, you can achieve digital operation management throughout the company.
1. The whole process of die casting production
Die casting production includes raw materials, molds, die casting process, quality inspection and other four aspects. Among them, quality inspection runs through the other three aspects. As shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 Die Casting Production and Quality Inspection
Raw materials: including the composition and mechanical properties of raw materials. According to the customer's material requirements and special characteristics, provide the required raw materials. The testing requirements for raw materials mainly include spectral analysis, tensile testing, K-value K-mode impurity detection and gas content detection.
Mold: Design die-casting mold according to customer's product drawings and die-casting production requirements, use UG or ProE software for 3D model design, use mold flow software PROCAST for die-casting simulation, optimize die-casting mold casting system and cooling system to ensure die-casting The size can meet the requirements during production, the internal quality meets the requirements and the requirements of continuous and stable production.
Die-casting process: The die-casting process is the most basic guarantee for die-casting. It includes direct processes such as die-casting parameters, mold temperature, and aluminum liquid temperature, as well as equipment operating conditions and production conditions (water, electricity, gas, liquid). parameter. Die casting production requirements ensure continuity and stability of these process parameters.
The die casting parameters mainly refer to the clamping force, the injection speed, the pressurization pressure, the build time and the thickness of the cake. These parameters are derived from the mold design and the mold flow analysis, and the verification results when debugging the product. The die-casting equipment guarantees the stability of these determined die-casting parameters during die-casting production, and enables real-time monitoring of these parameters, providing an alarm message when the tolerance is exceeded.
The mold temperature refers to the control for ensuring the internal and surface quality of the die-cast product during continuous production of die-casting. It also comes from the analysis of the mold temperature field during mold design. The monitoring of mold temperature is mainly a kind of infrared and thermal imager. It is equipped with corresponding monitoring instruments to track the temperature changes of key parts of the mold in real time, record for technicians to analyze and adjust, and has temperature alarm function.
The temperature of the aluminum liquid refers to the temperature monitoring of the aluminum liquid holding furnace. The temperature of the aluminum liquid is a key factor that directly affects the die casting product. The aluminum liquid holding furnace must have the function of automatically maintaining the temperature, and has the functions of low temperature and over temperature alarm.
The operating state of the equipment mainly refers to the operation mode of the die casting machine and auxiliary equipment, including automatic, semi-automatic and manual.
Other aspects mainly refer to the basic production guarantee factors such as the water pressure of the cooling water, the compressed air pressure, the power supply and the pressure of the release liquid.
Quality inspection: It refers to the dimensional inspection of the first and last parts of the product during die casting production, as well as the surface and internal quality inspection of intermediate products.
2. Die casting production digitization
The above analysis of all aspects of the whole process of die casting production, digitalization of die casting production is to real-time detection and control of the various elements of the whole process of die casting, using software to analyze and judge the information of these elements, generate various parameter trend charts and management reports With intelligent decision support.
The development of modern industry, especially the development of automation, provides an industrial basis for the digitalization of die-casting production. Modern die-casting machine has entered the era of industrial computer, it has the real-time recording and storage capacity of die-casting process parameters, and also fully integrates the operation information of auxiliary equipment, including pouring machine, pick-up machine, spray machine, mold temperature machine and vacuum machine. And other auxiliary equipment. The main communication method between the die casting machine and these auxiliary equipment is Profibus.
Another important aspect of digitalization of die-casting production is the widespread use of various digital sensors, including pressure, temperature, displacement, thermal imager, and visual recognition systems. These sensors lay the foundation for digitalization and even intelligence.
2.1 Digitization of Die Casting Units
The main data of the die casting production process are as follows:
(1) Raw material data: mainly raw material composition test report, mechanical performance report and K value report;
(2) Mold data: mainly 3D model report of mold, mold flow analysis report, mold preparation report;
(3) Die casting process data: production status of die casting unit, die casting parameters, mold temperature, aluminum liquid temperature and water and electricity and other basic production guarantee parameters;
(4) Quality data: full-scale inspection report of the product, process size report, process surface quality report and process internal quality report;
(5) Production management data: production orders, material preparation reports, and product output reports. The production orders and material preparation reports are from the production plan of the company's ERP system, and the product output reports are from the bar code scanning system at the production site.
2.2 Intelligent interconnection of die-cast digital units
The die-casting production unit based on the above data is a digital basic die-casting unit. To realize the digitization of the entire die-casting workshop, it is necessary to establish the intelligent interconnection of these die-casting units. The main domestic way of intelligent interconnection is DNC and MDC, and the DNC method is “distributed numerical control”. "Distributed digital control, which can realize two-way concurrent communication of all digital die-casting units through one server, with functions such as remote communication and forced uploading. The MDC method is "manufacturing data collection", that is, manufacturing data collection, which can A server can automatically acquire 4096 digital units at the same time, compatible with die casting machines, robots and automated production lines.
The structure of the NDC and MDC systems is shown in Figure 2.
2.3 Digital Management
On the basis of the establishment of digital production units and intelligent interconnection, the establishment of a digital management system can bring out the functions of digitization.
The MES system is the center of digital die casting production, and the MES is the "manufacturing execution system", which is the manufacturing execution system. The MES system refers to the shop floor-level management information system between the upper plan management system and the underlying industrial control. It provides the operator/manager with plan execution, tracking and all resources (people, equipment, materials, customers). Current status of demand, etc.) It enables the optimal management of the entire production process from order to product completion through information transfer. When real-time events occur at the factory, the MES can respond to, report on, and direct and process them with current accurate data. This rapid response to changes in state allows MES to reduce the absence of value-added activities within the company and effectively guide the plant's production operations so that it can improve the factory's ability to deliver goods on time, improve material flow performance, and improve Production return rate. MES also provides mission-critical information about product behavior across the enterprise and throughout the product supply chain through two-way direct communication.
The main functions of the MES system are:
(1) Optimize the production management mode of the enterprise, strengthen process management and control, and achieve refined management objectives.
(2) Strengthen the collaborative office capacity of each production department, improve work efficiency and reduce production costs.
(3) Improve the timeliness and accuracy of statistical analysis of production data, avoid human interference, and promote the standardization of enterprise management.
(4) Provide effective and standardized management support for quality inspection of products, intermediate products and raw materials of enterprises.
(5) Real-time control of information such as planning, scheduling, quality, process, and equipment operation, so that relevant departments can find problems and solve problems in time.
(6) Finally, the MES system can be used to establish a standardized production management information platform, so that the information between the internal control layer and the management layer of the enterprise can be interconnected, so as to improve the core competitiveness of the enterprise.
The architecture of the MES system is shown in Figure 3.
Through the digital scheduling, digital production coordination, digital resource management, and digital decision support, the MES system can greatly enhance the company's scientific planning, production process synergy, and deep integration of production equipment and informationization. Decision-making in data analysis supports transparent and quantitative management of enterprises, which can greatly improve production efficiency and product quality.
To sum up, the digitalization of die-casting production is the trend of the times, the need of enterprise development, and the need for “Made in China” to embark on the “Made in China”. Every die-casting company should take the digital footsteps for the realization of "China's wisdom", and make efforts and contributions for the development of the enterprise and for the wisdom of China!
