【Introduction to Sheet Metal Knowledge】Cut Sheets, Standard Sizes, Scrap Materials: Advantages and Disadvantages of Each

basic information

【Cut Plates, Standard Lengths, and Scrap Materials: Advantages and Disadvantages of Each】 During the Showa era, mass production was mainstream, utilizing turret punch presses to produce lockers and steel furniture in large quantities, such as lots of 100 or 200. The basic culture was to purchase cut plates (sketch materials) and process them. With the geographical advantage of Higashi-Osaka, there were many individually operated shearing shops, providing deliveries in various dimensions and quantities. Even during that time, scrap was primarily just the leftover cutouts, resulting in minimal waste, as most of the material could be used for products. 【Transition from Cut Plates to Standard Lengths】 In 2008, our company introduced a combined processing machine with laser and turret punch press capabilities. The most significant change with this introduction was in the purchasing method of steel materials. It marked a transition from a culture of cut plates to a culture of standard lengths. Previously, one part was processed from one plate, but with the introduction of the combined processing machine, the method changed to extracting multiple parts from a single plate. While the processing speed improved dramatically, the amount of scrap significantly increased as a consequence.

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Applications/Examples of results

**Prospects for the Future** By implementing nighttime autonomous driving, we have significantly achieved the rationalization of cutting processes. However, inevitably, there is leftover material from the last piece by the next morning. While we are deepening our nesting (layout of parts) to eliminate leftover material, we are also working on effective utilization by determining the dimensions that will remain as leftover material and keeping track of that material. However, management is still largely dependent on human oversight, and we aim to build a system for automatic recognition and management of leftover material. We are transitioning from mass production using sketch materials to improving productivity with standard-sized materials. Moving forward, we will focus on building a system to manage rational nesting.