DELMIA Robotic Simulation and Offline Programming Enable Dumur Industries to Expand Fabrication Capability

Auburn Hills, Mich – Dassault Systèmes has announced that its DELMIA Robotics simulation solution has been implemented by Dumur Industries (White City, Canada), with the company experiencing major gains in manufacturing efficiency. Dumur is a precision metal manufacturing specialist serving the ground vehicle defense market.

Company president Bob Dumur is extremely pleased with the results of the technology. “We easily achieved our return on investment in the software within a year, and we’re currently bringing on another programmer to expand the capability created by these efficiency gains.”

Dumur Industries began its migration to robots in 2003, recently purchasing a 5-axis gantry-style laser robot, optimized with the CENIT FASTRIM® solution built upon the DELMIA V5 Robotics platform. The technology is being applied to cut holes in an aluminum air reservoir tank with the 3D laser creating 7-8 holes within 30 seconds. According to Mr. Dumur, without this technology the holes would have to be machined on milling equipment, taking up to 40 minutes to produce, not including the individual setup time and the difficulties faced in machining thin-walled aluminum components.

The company is also applying the DELMIA technology to its robotic welding equipment, providing a fully functional tooling interface for the design and simulation of complex tooling and fixture device clamps. A major advantage of this simulation solution is the offline programming (OLP) capability, which allows the company to accurately program its robotic systems without tying up physical resources on the factory floor. Mr. Dumur estimates that programming time on the actual robots has been reduced from 20 hours per program down to two to three hours.

“The Dumur team took off running with FASTRIM,” states Cenit account manager, Niall Cullen. “Early on they saw the benefits and efficiencies obtained from 3D digital manufacturing and extended OLP beyond 3D laser trimming. FASTCURVE allows Dumur to stay ahead of production demands and identify manufacturing opportunities in 3D before parts hit the floor. Their innovation has allowed them to expand their manufacturing capability and capacity.”

Dumur Industries is now in the process of applying CENIT FASTCURVE® to a 7-axis robot for plasma cutting. Mr. Dumur notes, “The level of complexity in programming a complicated system like this could not be accomplished efficiently without simulating and offline programming in a virtual 3D world. The DELMIA solutions have allowed us to re-process the way we fabricate components and take on new challenges that we could not have profitably considered previously.”

Dumur Industries has found the robotic simulation solutions perfectly adapted to all areas of its business, where it produces components ranging from hand-held sizes upward to fabrications that are over 20 feet by 10 feet in size and manufactured in diverse materials from steel to aluminum and exotic metals.