Issue n. 7 - September 2007Download pdf - BLM GROUP
No. 7 - 2007
INSPIRED for
TUBE
ENG
www.blmgroup.com
Contents
INSPIRED FOR TUBE
Contents
4
PUKY
Quality always pays
INSPIRED FOR TUBE
8
BLM GROUP USA
Growing with the market
10
HARTWALL
Intelligent solutions
for logistics
14
ARTUBE
New Artube software
16
CMM
From steel sheet to tube
20
SGM
Increasingly more tube
in complex frames
Also available in pdf format on:
www.blmgroup.com
INSPIRED FOR TUBE
2
Edited by:
Area Comunicazione
BLM GROUP
Antonio Farese
Emanuela Colombo
Cristina Guzzetti
e-mail: pr@blm.it
tel. +39 031 7070 200
Produced by:
BLM GROUP
Via Selvaregina 30
22063 Cantù (CO) Italy
www.blmgroup.com
Number
INSPIRED FOR TUBE
Nr. 7 - 09/2007
Graphic Design:
Studio Grafico Page
Vincenzo De Rosa
Fabrizio Santini
Printed by:
Intergrafica, Verona
Photography:
AEFFE
Fabrizio Santini
BBR
Reproduction of all or part of
articles or illustrations published
in this edition cannot
be used without prior authorisation.
OPINION
INVESTING IN INNOVATION
AND GROWTH
As part of the BLM GROUP’s strategic vision as a global
supplier of tube fabrication equipment, BLM GROUP USA,
its North American subsidiary, has announced the Grand
Opening of larger facilities to serve its growing customer
base. Its new headquarters, equipment demonstration,
and customer training facility opened for full operation on
24 September 2007 in Wixom, Michigan.
Since opening for operation in 2001, BLM GROUP USA
has experienced significant growth in its territory. This success
is attributed to the growing recognition of the high
performance and reliability of BLM and ADIGE tube fabrication
equipment, the company’s emphasis on responsive
customer service, and an experienced service, sales,
and senior management team.
INSPIRED FOR TUBE
James P. Rutt
The BLM GROUP USA’s overall philosophy is to help their
customers to be successful. It does this by offering the investments
made by the BLM GROUP in the development
of advanced tube fabrication equipment. These investments
are aimed at providing an “unfair competitive advantage”
in manufacturing productivity and quality to its
customers. These new equipment developments also
provide additional degrees of design freedom to BLM GROUP USA’s customers giving them
the ability to apply a greater degree of innovation and flexibility needed to respond to ever
changing global markets.
BLM GROUP USA’s new 32,000 sf facility represents an important investment in its commitment
to customer support in North America. It offers tube fabricators and OEM manufacturers
the opportunity to conduct hands on evaluations of the latest BLM and ADIGE tube
fabrication technology. The facility houses a broad array of tube forming and tube cutting
equipment capable of offering North American firms the opportunity to strengthen their competitive
position in the global economy. The facility houses an expanded customer service
staff and is now also able to offer expanded training programs for customer programmers,
operators, and maintenance personnel.
Further expansion is planned in the 4th Quarter 2007, with the startup of a Tube Fabrication
Technology and Customer Training Center to be located in the Los Angeles, California area.
The center will provide technical support and service, training, applications demonstrations,
and sales for tube forming and cutting equipment to existing and prospective new customers
in the western regions of the US, Canada, and Mexico.
James P. Rutt
President and Chief Operating Officer
BLM GROUP USA Corporation
3
Puky produces children’s bicycles, tricycles and Go-Karts
guaranteeing uncompromised quality.
Quality always pays
INSPIRED FOR TUBE Infancy
Talking about children’s bikes, tricycles and Go-
Karts in Germany means talking about Puky. In
fact, the company from Wülfrath, near Düsseldorf
is the German leader in the production of children’s
vehicles both in terms of the high-tech applied
in the production process, as well as the
endless innovations and technical solutions applied
to each of its products. All this derives from
the profound belief that the vehicles must adapt
to the child and not vice versa. For this reason,
Puky has been on the market since a distant 1949
and continues to produce in Germany although
there has been great pressure as regards their
prices. Besides the home market, Puky exports
throughout Europe, Japan and Australia with a
turnover of 20 - 25 million Euros, of which a mere
20% derives from exports.
Quality and safety
Puky executives, Rolf Kuchenbecker and Ralf
Puslat together with Michael Bunte, Technical executive
of the company strongly believe that production
can continue in Germany regardless of
strong competition.
A fundamental factor is the commitment to guarantee
an uncompromised quality: “We should always
bear in mind that children’s toys will never
be used as they should”, says Kuchenbecker. “A
child may all too often take a friend on board the
rear saddle or a parent may decide to sit on a
child’s bike to revive his/her childhood memories.
All these uses should be contemplated, whether
we are looking at bikes, GoKarts or other Puky
products”.
When a rack or frame brakes, obviously, parents
will never ask their children whether they have
used it properly and children will “hardly tell their
parents that they tried the bike out going down
a flight of steps”; as Michael Bunte knows from
experience with his three children.
Puky, with its 90 employees, checks all steps from
the design phase, through to production (tube
bending, drilling, deformation, welding and painting),
logistics, quality control and the severe final
control tests.
In fact, as qualitative standards, both components
and Puky finished products not only meet the DIN
or EN standards for toys but further tests are carried
out on special test devices. Only components
that pass the resistance tests are used for the assembly.
Safety for children
“Quality always pays ”, emphasises Kuchenbecker,
and the growing turnover over the last few
years confirm this. Customers have again gone
back to having a perception of greater product
value. Moreover, greater quality, together with exchangeable
parts that can be ordered for many
years, guarantee use of the article for as long
as possible. These factors, too, are again soughtafter
by the customer.
“For next season, the company intends to launch
many new products on the market ” says
Kuchenbecker. “This does not, however, mean
that Puky is simply following the latest trends.
In fact, there are some products that will never
be made because they fall short of meeting the
quality criteria, and they are not really necessary
to a child’s development. Let us never forget
our slogan: “Sicher Kind sein”, i.e. “Safety
for children”.
4
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Michael Bunte,
Technical Director PUKY GMBH & CO. KG
INSPIRED FOR TUBE Infancy
6
A 30 year long alliance
As mentioned in the beginning, one of the fundamental
elements of Puky’s philosophy of “quality
without compromise” is the use of technologically
avant-garde machines and concepts. To this
end, it is interesting to note that since the ‘70s,
Puky has been using BLM machines, as can be
seen by the CNC Dynamo-E-MR-200 tube bending
machine that was installed in view of a new
production reorganisation, to produce tubes in
silence and with an all-electric technology for use
in bicycle, tricycle and Go-Kart frames.
“BLM has always been the only producer of tube
bending machines that are able to offer standard
products as well as unique tailored solutions with
unbeatable quality for the price ” explains Rolf
Kuchenbecker. “Then a fundamental element is
BLM’s competence in issues on bending technology.
The BLM staff does not try to sell you a special
machine at all costs. To the contrary, they focus
on trying to find directions and solutions that can
be installed on standard machines with modifications
to the tools and programming software.
And BLM does not simply sell a machine to then
forget about it. Quite the contrary, its staff visits
customers on a regular basis and shares the experiences
gained on the machines. In this way,
our operators have been able to develop processing
programmes with extremely complex
geometries directly by themselves, succeeding
in creating an in-house know-how in such a short
time ”.
The customer service is directly followed by the
German BLM branch in Unna. Among other
things, the new machines can be diagnosed in
remote mode, through the Internet, directly from
the Italian headquarters and this service has been
much appreciated by Puky. Nevertheless, if it were
absolutely necessary, in an emergency situation,
a technician is available from Italy at all times.
Perfect cells
Alongside the uncompromised quality, the test
lab, direct assembly and a vast range of innovative
products, another important factor that con-
INSPIRED FOR TUBE
Infancy
tributes to the success of Puky is a factory organised
in production cells.
“Each cell consists of one or two BLM tube bending
machines that are complete, if necessary, with
a punching machine, press or other devices that
have developed and manufactured in-house to
perform grooves, drill holes or other operations,
and a welding station. Each tube bending machine
is equipped with a loader from where the
machine takes the tube, bends it and places it on
a chute or a conveyor belt. The operator then shift
it to other cells that complete the processing cycle
” explains Michael Bunte.
“As opposed to the past, one operator is responsible
for the an entire component/product
assembly (tubular frame). The advantage of this
method is that the operator can immediately
spot a problem on the processing line, such as
a bent frame that does not access the welding
station. The error is immediately eliminated.
In the past, a problem would only have been
noticed downstream the welding unit and perhaps
after a few hundred pieces had already
been welded incorrectly ”.
“To have changed the production method has
given extremely positive results: we have increased
production by 25% and decreased the
production area by 30%. This makes it possible
to have extra space for other cells, thereby increasing
the direct production output and to carry
out various jobs that were once outsourced ”.
As far as numbers are concerned, Puky produces
from 300,000 to 350,000 single pieces
per year, per shift. When raw material becomes
expensive, it is important to have semi-finished
products with a constant quality at adequate
prices. This is also applicable to tube. And this
is where the BLM tube bending machines come
into the picture again thanks to the fact that they
are able to compensate for the tolerance oscillation
in the raw material.
After the experience with BLM, it goes without
saying that the Westphalian company will continue
to use Italian technology and produce uncompromised
quality for the safety of its young
customers.
Source: www.bbr.de
PUKY GMBH & CO. KG
Fortunastraße 11
42489 Wülfrath
Tel: 02058/773-0
E-Mail: info@puky.de
www.puky.de
No. 7 - September 2007
7
BLM GROUP USA Announces NewNorth American Headquarters
Customer Support and Training Center
Growing with the market
INSPIRED FOR TUBE Event
BLM GROUP USA is pleased to advise its customers
in the US and CANADA of its investment
in larger facilities to support it’s growing number
of existing customers and prospective new customers
of its broad line of tube fabricating equipment
in North America
An area of 32,000 feet at the
customer’s service
The company has moved into a new 32,000
square foot state of the art building housing an
expanded customer service department, customer
training facility, and spare parts inventory.
The facility will also house an a broad range of the
latest tube fabrication equipment available to its
customers as a demonstration laboratory to help
improve the productivity and quality of tube fabrication
processes using the latest generation of
CNC benders, end formers, cold saws, and laser
based tube cutting systems.
The Grand Opening Ribbon Cutting Celebration
will be held at its new facility at 29380 Beck Road,
Wixom, MI 48393 on Monday, September 24,
2007 at 10:00am. The event will be attended by
customers, state and local elected officials, state
and local Economic Development Commission
representatives, local suppliers, and representatives
of the metal fabrication industry associations
including the Fabricators and Manufacturers Association
and the Society of Manufacturing Engineers.
Also in attendance will be editors from the
metal fabrication industry including THE FABRI-
CATOR and TUBE & PIPE JOURNAL, as well as
local newspapers from southeast Michigan.
8
BLM GROUP USA’s Service Team (left to right): Kevin McCune, Jessy Felix, Victor Wooster, Cheryl Kimball,
Bret Ramer, Sean Wicks, Jeffry Cole, Mauro Corno, Kim Klan, Jim Crocker, Patrik Lorenzon
(not in the picture: Gerry Cochran, Rich King, Larry Peterson, Patti Kimball).
The competitive advantage
Following the ribbon cutting ceremony, the technical
staff of BLM GROUP USA will describe and
demonstrate its advanced tube fabricating equipment
and software for the attendees. .
The presentations and demonstrations will be followed
by discussions of how the products of the
BLM GROUP are helping companies in Michigan
improve their competitive position in the face of
increased global competition. Business owners
from three Michigan companies will meet with the
state and local economic development representatives
and the press to describe how their investment
in advanced BLM and ADIGE tube fabrication
equipment has helped them improve their
business and increase the employment in their
companies using the new high efficiency fabrication
capabilities of this technology.
The Grand Opening Ceremonies will be followed
by a buffet lunch for all attendees
BLM GROUP USA CORP.
29380 Beck Road, Wixom, MI
48393, USA
Tel. : +1 (248)-560-0080
Fax.: +1 (248)-560-0083
Email: sales@blmgroupusa.com
No. 7 - September 2007
9
Hartwall, Finland, has chosen lasertube to improve efficiency
in the production of logistics trolleys
Intelligent solutions
for logistics
Hartwall in Sipoo, Finland is a family business that
was founded back in 1932 (it has now reached
the third generation) and is a leader in the field of
logistics solutions for material handling. In 2006
it achieved a turnover of 100 million Euros with
500 employees and three production facilities:
the one in Sipoo, one in England and one in Scotland.
At Hartwall, research in finding intelligent solutions
for logistics shows how it is possible to specialise
in a product that appears to be quite simple
and mature in an extremely competitive field.
The logistics role
The current market is characterised by a series
of important “parameters”, such as: high competitiveness;
a considerably shorter life cycle;
complexity of the products,; increasingly exacting
lead-times required by the customer; reduction
in the profit margins; growth in the customers
expectations as regards the “service level” and
the corporate goal being to satisfy the customer
and maintain customer loyalty.
The achievement of this goal particularly affects
the company’s marketing, innovation and Service/logistics
divisions who are forced to meet the
exacting requirements in terms of speed, availability,
regularity and flexibility. This is where highly
innovative and reliable logistics solutions such
as the ones designed and implemented by Hartwall,
are of fundamental strategic importance to
modern industry.
Customer-oriented
“In this scenario - says Jerker Hartwall, General
Manager of the company - you need to be
able to provide targeted and reliable solutions
to our customers that range from shopping centres
and supermarkets, the food and beverage
industry, post offices, the automobile industry
to the laundries. Extremely diverse sectors that
all have a common need and that is to transport
their products in a safe way from the production
or processing sites to the retail outlet or
the next step in their transformation ”.
“Hartwall’s “mission” is to find solutions that
allow the various users to reduce the amount of
space occupied, to use the same trolleys for
transporting and displaying goods at the point
of sale, to guarantee that the solution can be
used again and again and can guarantee high
levels of cleanliness and hygiene, particularly
when used in the food industry and reducing
the level of labour required for handling ”.
Jerker Hartwall,
Direttore Generale.
No. 7 - September 2007 INSPIRED FOR TUBE Logistics
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11
INSPIRED FOR TUBE
Logistics
The solutions that have been perfected by Hartwall
are wheeled dolly trolleys of various design
and type studied to transport and house products
in a reliable and safe manner, such as milk
and fruit juice cartons, beverages, fruit and vegetables.
Or to transport letters and packages or
car components and linen and even to transport
and display flowers.
Competitive choices
“To reach our level of specialisation - continues
Hartwall – with a substantially simple and mature
product, in a strongly competitive sector, we had
to understand the user’s needs ahead of time and
invest in production technologies that would help
us to be extremely reactive and efficient in our
production and supply ”.
The degree of specialisation shows how Hartwall
has become customer and market oriented. In
the production field, the choice to be competitive
has taken a global sourcing direction in procuring
raw materials and production efficiency with
the purchase of four ADIGE lasertube cutting system.
In fact, trolleys and dollies are essentially
made from tubular structures that have been suitably
worked and assembled.
If one considers that over 1.5 million trolleys are
produced each year, the cost incidence of raw
materials and processing is evident.
12
A single uninterrupted cycle
“With four ADIGE lasertube cutting systems the material
flow on the shop floor has been drastically simplified,
passing directly from the tube bundles to bending
and welding ” says Hartwall. “The insert fittings
have been designed so that a single processing cycle
is required without any interruption to pass over
to various other machines, thereby guaranteeing reduced
cycle times. In this way, the 87 welding robots
used in the various production facilities are a continuous
flow from the production lines as well as constant
quality. The production efficiency deriving from
all this allows Hartwall to guarantee short lead times,
and to be close to the customer, particularly the English,
Danish, Scottish and Czech markets, besides
Finland of course, and outside Europe also in the United
States, South Africa and Russia. It is now clear
what Hartwall means by his slogan “Intelligent logistics
solutions ”; after having visited the company, it is
easier to understand and agree with.
K. HARTWALL OY AB
Kay Hartwallin tie 2
FIN-01150 Söderkulla
Finland
Tel. +358 9 413 18 33
Fax +358 9 272 1484
No. 7 - September 2007 INSPIRED FOR TUBE Logistics
13
ARTUBE software for Lasertube systems developed
by ADIGE on the basis of its applicative experience
New Artube software
INSPIRED FOR TUBE Technology
Much too often, when talking about laser cutting
machines and systems, the software that programs,
controls and manages them is taken for
granted. That is, all specific functions that are developed
so that the machine can be integrated in
the production process are left aside. Whereas,
they are often the key features when choosing a
system. In a market that is increasingly more uniform
and competitive as regards technology, it is,
in fact, the software that makes the difference and
qualifies the production systems more and more,
including those for tube laser cutting.
To confirm its technological leadership in the sector
once again, ADIGE has recently fine tuned
ARTUBE, a new software designed ad hoc for
lines of the Lasertube systems, developed specifically
for processing tubes.
And from observing the hundreds of applications
used day after day, the world over and in the most
varied of production sectors, ARTUBE was developed,
anticipating customer requirements and
offering new functionalities.
Projects and prototypes
in less time
ARTUBE helps to design, plan and manage the
production of tubular pieces on laser cutting machines.
The main advantages compared to the
previous generation are even easier use and more
ample libraries with preset processing that can
also be customised. In this way, users can materialise
the idea into the finished product in just a
few minutes without requiring specific skills or expert
personnel.
This means a vertical reduction in designing and
prototyping times, thereby reducing the time to
market new products to the minimum indispensable;
a benefit that adds up to significant savings,
with the advantage of added value.
Important additional
functions are:
- The possibility of importing files in step, iges
and xt format, of modifying them and allowing
CAM processing, without having to design the
piece from scratch again;
- The management of special or particularly complex
sections so that even unusual tubes can
14
e cut;
- Automatic application of optimum
cutting parameters to
guarantee high yield at all times and
high production efficiency
- The automatic generation of cutting
strategies to optimise the cutting route and
associated cycle time;
- To create cutting programs for open profiles as
well and not only tubes.
An even more complete
package
The focus placed by ADIGE on the importance
of software has been confirmed by the fact that
two other main solutions can be added to AR-
TUBE to complete the tube processing package.
ASSEMLER: CAD/CAM parametric and 3D software
to design complex tubular structures and
frames using very little data to start with. Among
the functions, the automatic end forming, of all
the intersections of various components, is worthy
of mention, likewise the management of coupling
methods and automatic development of
parametric fittings. These are all functions that
help the programmer to concentrate on the functional
technical choices and not in the technical
aspects of programming each frame component.
CIM: a specially designed software for remote
production management to process customer orders
(by priority, due date and quantity), to effect
nesting in order to optimise production, to have
a control over the entire in-line production means
with production balances and historical file.
ADIGE SPA
Via per Barco, 11
38056 Levico Terme (TN) Italy
tel. +39 0461 729000
fax +39 0461 701410
E-mail: vendite@adige.it
No. 7 - September 2007 INSPIRED FOR TUBE Technology
15
INSPIRED FOR TUBE Jobshop
CMM, Italy, has developed its own laser activity
from steel sheet to tube processing
From steel sheet to tube
When back in 1994, Luigi Ghirardi, owner of CMM
Tecnologie Metallurgiche Avanzate from Medole
in the Province of Mantova decided to make a
leap in quality by entering in the laser world, he
already had clear ideas of what he was doing.
“I had been processing steel sheet for over twenty
years when I started to perceive the limits and
“dangers” that we would have come across as a
sub-supplier if we hadn’t pursued quality and productivity.
So we directed the company’s activity
towards the laser world, but here too, I understood
the need to open out to new sectors other than
those I was already serving. Therefore we needed
a machine that could perform the primary
scope of laser cutting flat sheets but, which at the
same time, would allow opening out to new possibilities,
such as those predicted in cutting tubular
structures. And this is why one of the first
laser cutting machines installed in CMM had a
tube cutting option.
Two different approaches
This initial experience was determinant and enlightening
for CMM as it allowed the company
to understand the great potential of the tube and
bar cutting market; a completely different sector
to that of steel sheet, which was more restrictive,
but more varied. This is why CMM is still divided
into two divisions: “Steel sheet processing”,
with three laser systems and “Tube processing”,
with seven fully automatic laser machines, three
of which are for “3D working”.
This division is also a physical one as the two
divisions operate in two distinct buildings considering
that the two activities require different approaches:
as to processing steel sheet it is useful
to have alternative machines to expand the
processing range and the space required to stack
the material is relatively small; whereas to process
tube, the laser can perform most of the processes,
whereas it is indispensable to have large areas
for both raw tubes as well as cut tubes.
16
INSPIRED FOR TUBE
all, the Group produces over half
a million tons of semi-finished and finished
steel products. The numbers that
explain how the Manni Group alone has been
protagonist with supplies to various steelworks
of one third of the semi-finished steel products
used for the Nuovo Polo Fieristico (The New
Tradefair Centre) in Milan, the largest in Europe.
Over half a million tons
Since 2006 CMM has become an integral and
qualifying part of the Manni HP group whose industrial
activities are in the steel field and in the
pre-worked component business.
With an aggregate turnover of more than 500
million Euros (2006) and over 800 employees,
the Manni HP takes a leading position on the
Italian market for pre-worked components in
steel for the construction and mechanical sectors
and the insulating metal panel sector. All in
The core of the business project of the Manni
HP Group is the constant research for excellence
in serving the customer; its mission is to
“create value in a satisfactory measure for the
customer”. For this reason, each unit of the
Group from Verona makes up a real “service
centre”, that is an operator who is able to interact
with the customer in a complex activity
of co-makership, offering a contribution in the
project, production information and improving
the loyalty level of the customers that are typi-
No. 7 - September 2007
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17
INSPIRED FOR TUBE Jobshop
cal of those who only commercialise steel products.
To this end, CMM backed by its original knowhow
and long experience, plays the important
role of service centre for laser cutting of tubes,
bars and profiles, therefore processing more
than 50% of the tubular material of the Group.
Medium/large-sized tube
CMM was the first Italian company in its sector
to constantly invest over the years in a consistent
and significant manner thus becoming
the first in Europe to have the greatest number
of laser tube plants installed.
“We have dedicated a 5,000 m2 building for this
sector – says Ghirardi –
where seven laser tube plants
have been installed to process
tubes, pipes and profiles with a
maximum diameter of 508 mm and
14 m length.
Among these are the four ADIGE LASER-
TUBE 712D machines for tubes up to 80 mm
in diameter and lengths of 6.5 or 8.5 m, an ADI-
GE COMBO system used to process square
and rectangular profiles with sections exceeding
80 mm and lengths of 12 m and, most of all,
the last machine is an ADIGE JUMBO system
used to cut tubes with a diameter of up to 508
mm, squares measuring 400 x 400 mm and rectangular
profiles measuring 500 x 300 mm with
lengths up to 14 m”.
It is evident how the corporate belief has turned
to processing medium/large tubes and it could
not be otherwise, considering the close relationship
with the Manni HP Group.
35% of good reasons
Besides laser cutting, CMM offers assistance during
the design phase, to implement 2D structures
by exploiting the enormous potentials offered by
18
the laser. “We realised that this type of service is
becoming increasingly necessary – continues
Ghirardi – to meet the demands of customers who
are not fully aware of the many possibilities offered
by this technology. The result of this strategy
is the contribution from the “Tube processing”
division to the company’s turnover, which is
in continuous growth and now exceeds 35%.
A winning combination
Last, but not least, it is to be said that the experience
gained by CMM in processing tubes is continuously
influencing the steel sheet sector, where
the company’s role is evolving from that of simply
carrying out work according to drawings, to technological
problem-solving.
“Laser processing of steel sheet and tube, although
they are structurally different, is nevertheless
a winning combination, where the knowhow
of one help to develop the other and vice
versa” concludes Mr. Ghirardi. “Undoubtedly,
the “tube” world is still young, as there are still
barriers that block the use of the laser and irregularities
in the tolerance of materials that
come from tube-making facilities.
As already mentioned, as far as the first point is
concerned, we are trying to deal with this with our
experience. On the other hand, as regards the
second, there is still a long way to go and a lot
to be done to promote the enormous opportunities
and competitive advantages of tubular structures.
We feel that these barriers will decrease as
the use of the laser increases in processing tubes
and bars, like it did with steel sheet”.
CMM SRL
Via Marchionale 72
46046 Medole (MN) Italy
Tel. +39 0373 898150
fax. +39 0373 868335
www.cmmlaser.it
No. 7 - September 2007 INSPIRED FOR TUBE Jobshop
19
The technological heart of SGM in Fermignano, Italy, is the laser tube
cutting system for the production of complex quality frames.
INSPIRED FOR TUBE Jobshop
Increasingly more tube
in complex frames
SGM located in Fermignano, Perugia is a company
specialised in the production of frames with
a strong vocation particularly for motorbike frames,
metal furnishings and fitness or free time equipment.
“I started making frames back in 1969 at Moto
Benelli - says Giacinti NOME, owner of SGM - and
I haven’t stopped since. I acquired skills and an
enviable experience in the manufacture of motorbike
frames to the point that in 1980 I decided
to make a quality leap and set up my own business.
So we started to manufacture frames and
components for big names such as Bimota, Moto
Guzzi and Cagiva, because that’s the only market
we were best acquainted with. As soon as we
got the opportunity we successfully expanded
the activity towards related sectors from the demand
point of view, such as the metal furnishing
industry, bicycles and fitness equipment. For
example Tecnogym, a company that is specialised
in fitness equipment is our key account”.
Comparing three generations
To work closely with the problems of manufacturing
motorbikes, with exacting technological
and quality requirements has allowed SGM to
gain skills in the laser tube cutting field, which still
remain the company’s “trademark”.
“The applications requested and the need to
make increasingly complex and articulated
frames with sophisticated intersections and as-
20
semblies – continues Giacinti – pushed us into
the laser tube world. First of all we purchased
an ADIGE LT651, which was shortly followed by
a LT652 and an ADILAS 2 system where we
combined flat steel sheet cutting. The most recent
purchase was made last year, when we installed
a new generation LT712D, which, compared
to the previous models that are still
absolutely valid and reliable, belong to a “completely
different world”. As I have all three generations
of ADIGE laser tube machines, I can
quite openly say that the LT 712D is far superior
to the previous models from a performance
point of view; and the numbers achieved prove
this fact: to cut one component we leaped from
an output of 34 pieces/hour with the “LT 652” to
106 pieces/hour with the “LT 712D”, because
there are practically no downtimes; the machine
passes over from one process to another in only
a few tenths of a second”.
No. 7 - September 2007 INSPIRED FOR TUBE Jobshop
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21
INSPIRED FOR TUBE Jobshop
Focused on tube
Today SGM manufactures top quality stainless
steel, iron, aluminium and high-resistance steel
frames with diameters ranging from 10 to 225 mm.
“Besides the output increase - explains Giacinti
– the other fundamental advantage that we have
found with the laser tube system is the high cutting
quality and repeatability, which facilitates the
next assembly phase”.
All this makes SGM the ideal partner for those
who have to manufacture frames and perceive
the potentials and advantages in designing articles,
whatever they may be with frames made directly
from tube; this is how we reason. We had
to change our mentality to focus on tube; the machines
give us the possibility of doing this, but it
was up to us to know how to exploit them and on
this note, the most difficult thing is to change the
customer’s mentality as all too often they still design
in the conventional way, without thinking of
the enormous advantages they would have if they
were to design their products right from the beginning
with the use of tube”.
“Tecnogym was the first to follow us ” says Giacinti.
“We have a consolidated relationship with
them up to the point that designing new articles
is positively influenced by the laser tube system.
In fact, the possibility of laser cutting any type of
section allows their designers to study and implement
articles with complex structures and
frames, fully exploiting the potentials of the laser
tube systems. We then receive the final projects,
which we simply examine from a feasibility viewpoint
and, if necessary, optimise it”. SGM is ISO
9002 certified and therefore design is not in-house.
22
A unique reference
By tradition, Tecnogym turns to those who are
able to provide a complete product without the
need for other sub-suppliers. SGM, therefore,
avails itself of the collaboration of a satellite company
that takes care of frame assembly and welding
and supplies a practically finished top quality
product.
“With Tecnogym - explains Giacinti - work main-
ly consists of cutting and bending tubes with peculiar
profiles; the most popular tube used for their
frames is the 120 x 60 mm elliptical section, which
I can assure you is not easy to work with, especially
when it has to be bent. We manage to do
this work with two old BLM tube bending machines,
which as far as reliability is concerned,
still work as if they were new; the quality of the
bend is good and that’s what counts for us”.
SGM SRL
Via T. Edison 3/5
61033 Fermignano (PU) Italy
Tel. +39 0722 330848
fax. +39 0722 330316
www.sgmsrl.com
No. 7 - September 2007 INSPIRED FOR TUBE Jobshop
23
TUBE BENDERS
TUBE END FORMERS
CUTTING DEBURRING AND WASHING
CUTTING AND END MACHINING
LASERTUBE CUTTING SYSTEMS
LASER CUTTING FOR SHEET AND SHEET&TUBE COMBINED
MATERIALS HANDLING SYSTEMS
3D MEASURING AND INSPECTION
PRODUCTION CELLS
NON CONTACT MEASUREMENT SYSTEMS
PROCESS CONTROL SOFTWARE
INSPIRED FOR TUBE
Via Selvaregina, 30
22063 Cantù (CO) Italy
tel. +39 031 7070200
fax +39 031 715911
e-mail: export@blm.it
Via per Barco, 11
38056 Levico Terme (TN) Italy
tel. +39 0461 729000
fax +39 0461 701410
e-mail: export@adige.it
Via dei Campi, 4
38050 Novaledo (TN) Italy
tel. +39 0461 720007
fax +39 0461 720214
e-mail: adigesys@adigesys.it
Also available in pdf format on:
www.blmgroup.com
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