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Canadian Metalworking - June 2020 - Toolroom tech upgrade

Toolroom tech upgrade
Volant updates its vending cabinets for a better tool management
strategy
By Lindsay Luminosoi

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Canadian Metalworking - June 2020 - Toolroom tech upgrade

olant has been a fixture in the oil and gas industry for the better part of 20 years. Thecompany got its start as a spinoff from an engineering consulting company andVgrew to be a manufacturer of casing running tools and accessories for oil andgas well construction. Located in Edmonton, the company operates an 80,000-sq.-ft. main building housing upwards of 170 employees, depending on market
fluctuation. However, even in the past few years when times were slow in the oil andgas sector across the province, Volant’s business was booming.
"I think it wasn’t until the oil and gas industry started seeing a need for our products andtheir added flexibility to the manufacturing process that we really started to take off,"
said Lockey Rhynold, product manager, Volant Products. "The company is heavily
populated by engineers, and their focus is on constant development of tooling, making
a light footprint in industry while making it safer. That’s the big thing, and it’s helped us
maintain a steady stream of non-stop business."i

The machine shop currently has 16 CNC machines, including milling, full 5-axis, andmultitasking machines. The shop can perform basic machining all the way up to very
complex component manufacturing.

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Canadian Metalworking - June 2020 - Toolroom tech upgrade

With the focus on making processes more efficient and safer, Rhynold began to rethink
the shop’s existing tool vending system.
"We wanted something with more bells and whistles than we were currently getting,"
said Rhynold. "So we decided to set out on a journey to find another vending systemthat had some of the features we were looking for. This gave us the ability to really startfrom scratch and see what was out on the market. What we found was that many of theofferings used the same infrastructure software. This meant that how the systems
operated was basically all the same; the cabinets were the only thing that wasdifferent."

Matrix Vending System
From the onset toolroom attendant and CNC programmer Ron Vocke was heavily
involved in the discussion. He knew the existing system and areas that could possibly
be improved with additional features and technology.
"It wasn’t just the technology we were interested in updating; we also wanted toincrease the size of the cabinets as we were continuing to grow our cutting tool library,"
said Vocke. "One thing that really attracted us to the Matrix vending system was its
developer. Tooling company Iscar seemed to have a much better understanding of how
this type of system would be used in a manufacturing environment rather than for justgeneral industry."
Volant worked with A.C.T. Equipment Sales, Edmonton, to ensure that the vending
system was right for them. In terms of the storage capacity, A.C.T. Equipment visitedthe facility and was able to size up all the tools that would need to be housed in thevending system. From there they were able to set up two cabinets that are linked to one
another, along with a mini-locker system that is used for larger tools and equipment thatcannot fit within the cabinets. This configuration maximized space in the shop andenabled Volant to condense its tooling dramatically in this small space.

Features
For Rhynold, the most important feature of the system was the ability to kit tools
together for specific projects.
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Canadian Metalworking - June 2020 - Toolroom tech upgrade"For example, let’s say we wanted a CNMG holder," he said. "Kitting gives us the seats,
screws, and everything that pertains to that holder, allowing us to get down to the nitty
gritty easily and effectively. This has allowed our staff to spend less time looking forscrews and shims that will fit. We really were looking to reduce the time our staff
needlessly spent in the toolroom."
Having tools set up in these kits would make it easier for operators to go into thetoolroom and know exactly all the tools and accessories that they would need tocomplete the job. Prior to adopting kitting, operators could spend a significant amount oftime looking through cabinet after cabinet for the right screw. In many cases, they would
grab a screw and think it was correct even though it wasn’t, which would cause failures
down the line. So kitting was an important feature for the company.
Rhynold added that another interesting feature that they weren’t necessarily looking forbut have found beneficial is the Matrix’s shopping cart-like functionality. An operator canload up all necessary tools for a job, whether it’s two or 30, check the list against whatis needed, and then click Issue and the vending system provides all necessary tools at
once rather than one by one.

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Canadian Metalworking - June 2020 - Toolroom tech upgradeiFor Vocke, one of the most important features he wanted was easily searchable tools.
Volant’s existing system wasn’t user-friendly, and operators and workers often wereunable to find what they needed quickly, if at all.
"I have to say part of that was on us for not coming up with a proper naming convention,
nomenclature, and that sort of thing," said Vocke. "So once we decided to go to a newsystem, I wanted to make sure that it had the ability to increase descriptions andinclude more comprehensive search parameters."
According to Rhynold, Vocke spent a great deal of time relabelling all the tools andeverything going into the system. He wanted to ensure that, although everyone has
their own industry-specific naming conventions, the new system would be able tocapture it all. He included all appropriate names that were searchable so every worker
coming in would be able to find exactly what they were looking for regardless of what
they called it.
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Canadian Metalworking - June 2020 - Toolroom tech upgrade

The duo made sure to discuss this with the guys on the shop floor, to see what theywanted more of or less of in a system. Was having a seven-digit ID code or part number
beneficial, or was it better to have a larger description section with keywords? Thesystem allows for many different fields of information to be added.
"The system can search by a number of different parameters, including keywords," said
Vocke. "We’ve tried to adopt a few of the common names that are known. It just gives
more flexibility for workers to find what they need. And I think we immediately saw huge
gains for people able to find what they needed."
Vocke added that A.C.T. was especially helpful during the process and was able tomass-upload everything from the shop’s previous system, making it an easy transition
from one system to another. Within a week the system was set up and basic training
allowed the team to hit the ground running.

Tool Management Strategies
When it comes to developing a tool management strategy, data and reporting are
essential components, and that’s exactly what this system provides Volant. There areover 200 standard reports that can be customized depending on the metrics needed,whether that’s an accounting of which workers are using what tools and for how long, oran overall value of inventory currently in the cabinet.
"By utilizing the whole management system and taking the features that come with it,
we are able to better understand the value of our inventory that we are carrying," said
Rhynold. "Currently we stock upwards of $250,000 in tooling. So now we can track what
we have in stock, what’s being used regularly, infrequently, or not at all. This information
has also allowed us to talk to our vendors and return stock that is unused. Now we’reslowly working toward minimizing what we need in stock. Back in the day you’d just buy
it because you thought you would need it and then it would go missing. That’s justmoney lost. This system and its data reports are really helping us better align our stock
management with our overall needs."
For Vocke, the system provides another feature that helps with inventory management:
the ability to send alarms and notifications when the last tool is removed from thecabinet. Although it does have minimums and maximums that they’ve built it, Vocke
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Canadian Metalworking - June 2020 - Toolroom tech upgrade

noted that it’s great to have another system in place to ensure the toolroom is fullystocked.
"When you have a supplier that’s willing to work with you on inventory management,
that’s a huge advantage," said Vocke. "With our supplier, we do quarterly reviews of ourstock, where any excess that we purchased and didn’t use can 100 per cent bereturned. That’s just one way that this software is giving us opportunities for growth.
However, it is important to note that it does take time to collect data; this system isreally only as good as the data it collects. In order to get results, there needs to be quite
a bit of data."
When a shop is looking to develop a tooling management strategy, there’s definitely abreak-in period between setup and insightful reporting. Volant is coming to the end of
the data-capture period and is now able to use the data to make actionable businessdecisions.
"The biggest thing with vending is you need to invest time and money to set it up
properly," said Rhynold. "And it’s only as good as the data you put into it. So the more
effort we put into it, the more we’re going to get out of it. And I think that’s wherecompanies lose interest in vending very quickly—they just don’t want to invest the timeand energy or they just simply want to know if they have an insert in stock. But we wantto know far more things than just basic stock; we want to utilize this system for kitting
and having our tools set up and ready to go for any job that comes in. We are trying totake tool management to a whole new level. And that’s where we’re at right now."

Areas of Opportunity
Rhynold added that one of the areas he hopes to take more advantage of is thesoftware’s offline seats. Volant has an extensive programming department that can now
use the system’s offline programming to create setup sheets for the workers on theshop floor. The programmers have the seat on their desktop and are adding bar codes
to set up sheets that correspond to the tools in the Matrix system. This now allows thecompany’s machinists to go to the system, which has a scanner on it, scan the sheets,and get all the tools needed without having to search.

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Canadian Metalworking - June 2020 - Toolroom tech upgrade"Our programming team has full visibility of what’s going on in the system without
needing to step foot in the toolroom," said Rhynold. "They can look at patterns or issues
and make adjustments to better help our machinists find what they need. With this, weare seeing trips to the storeroom limited in terms of frequency and time spent. It also
will help us to see patterns so we can adjust our tool management strategy to achieve
better results."

Associate Editor Lindsay Luminoso can be reached atlluminoso@canadianmetalworking.com.
Photos courtesy of Volant Products, www.volantproducts.ca.
Iscar, www.iscar.com
A.C.T. Equipment Sales, www.actequipment.com

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