Two factories under one roofThanks to its investment in a Bending Cell (consisting of an Xpert Pro press brake combined with a bending robot), the Swiss job shop Stoppani will soon also be able to produce during the night – completely autonomously.

Hans Gattlen has a clear vision: a “dual factory”, where people work during the day, and machines take over the night shift. This digital factory in Neuenegg near the Swiss capital of Berne will produce fully automatically and fully autonomously – thus saving costs and reducing the staff’s workload. Together with his team, Hans Gattlen, who has been a co-owner and the Chairman of Stoppani’s Board of Directors since late 2018, has introduced new structures over the past few months, and has, above all, significantly modernized the company’s sheet metal processing operations.

Substantial reduction of costs

In the next step, he intends to comprehensively digitalize Stoppani’s sheet metal processing in line with Industry 4.0. In this way, the entrepreneur wants to attract orders back to Switzerland, where the industry has found it increasingly difficult to compete against companies from abroad in recent years. This is due to the lower labor expenses in Italy, Portugal, and many Eastern European countries, which allow companies there to produce at 20 to 30 percent lower costs. “Fully automated production will enable us to reduce our own costs by around 35 percent,” he emphasizes

Fully automatic all through the night

生产的每个新部分必须提前编程。之后，可以根据需要检索程序。结合XPERT PRO PRESS BRAKE，机器人在无人干预的情况下更改握手和弯曲工具。但这还不是全部：智能的Bysoft 7软件决定了理想的弯曲顺序，以实现每个作业的最大效率。汉斯·加特伦（Hans Gattlen）说：“与仓库的整合对我们来说绝对是必不可少的，无论是要检索金属板和弯曲部分的存储。”“如果无法实现这一目标，那么操作员将始终绑在新闻制动器上。”

Entirely without human intervention

这是Stoppani选择旁路解决方案的主要原因。“我们以前的供应商不能保证仓库集成不仅对于当前的机器，而且对于将来的模型来说都是可能的。那是我意识到的：我们需要让新的合作伙伴加入。”

The principle: In the evening, when the staff have turned off the lights and gone home for the day, the robots and machines continue working. From 6 p.m. to 6 a.m., operations run fully automatically – entirely without human intervention. The staff no longer have to work night shifts or perform strenuous tasks and can dedicate their valuable time to more demanding bending jobs or other activities, such as programming the laser cutting machine.

满足每个要求

Bystronic launched the Bending Cell in 2018, and it is already in operation in Canada, Hungary, France, Italy, and the United States. The Bending Cell is available for the Xpert Pro 100, 150, 200, 250, and 320 press brakes. The maximum press capacity is 320 metric tons, and bending applications up to 3 meters are possible. Five robot types are available with lifting capacities ranging from 90 to 270 kilograms. Benedikt Kreisel: “This wide range of configurations enables Bystronic to offer its customers a setup that is tailored to their specific needs. The Bending Cell is also characterized by its flexibility in terms of applications,” says Benedikt Kreisel, Bending Automation Product Manager at Bystronic.

Find the whole story in the Bystronic World 02/20 customer magazine.