thyssenkrupp
Canvas Category OEM : Automotive
thyssenkrupp is an international group of companies comprising largely independent industrial and technology businesses and employing more than 100,000 people. Across 56 countries it generated sales of €34 billion in fiscal 2020/2021. Its business activities have been bundled in six segments: Materials Services, Industrial Components, Automotive Technology, Steel Europe, Marine Systems, and Multi Tracks. Backed by extensive technological know-how, the businesses develop cost-effective and resource-friendly solutions to the challenges of the future. Around 3,600 employees work in research and development at 78 locations all over the world, mainly in the fields of climate protection, the energy transition, digital transformation in the industry and mobility of the future. The thyssenkrupp group currently has a portfolio of approximately 18,100 patents and utility models. Under the umbrella brand thyssenkrupp, the group creates long-term value with innovative products, technologies and services and helps make life better for future generations. thyssenkrupp is listed in the MDAX index.
Assembly Line
🇩🇪 How Germany’s steelmakers plan to go green
Global steel production today accounts for at least 7 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions. In Germany, it emits more than a quarter of the country’s total industrial carbon dioxide. Salzgitter has said that once its revamped steel plant is run entirely on green hydrogen, its annual CO2 emissions, which currently stand at 8mn tonnes, will drop by a staggering 95 per cent.
German authorities have pledged more than €6bn in subsidies to steelmakers in a bid to shore up Europe’s largest industrial base, which is already struggling with high energy prices and falling global demand for its cars and machinery. The full implementation of the EU’s carbon border adjustment mechanism, a tariff regime intended to give Europe’s basic industries protection from cheaper, dirtier imports while they decarbonise their own operations, has opened a window of opportunity for such heavy investment.
thyssenkrupp selects Samotics to increase reliability of its steel manufacturing process
thyssenkrupp Steel installed Samotics’ SAM4 Health solution as part of a proof-of-value pilot, initially monitoring 100 critical conveyor rolls at its Duisburg plant in Germany—Europe’s biggest steelmaking site. In the first few months of the pilot, the system detected multiple critical faults at an early stage including mechanical unbalance and bearing degradation. This enabled thyssenkrupp Steel to replace the affected machines before they failed, preventing significant unplanned downtime and its associated costs. After the initial success of the pilot project, thyssenkrupp extended the use of the SAM4 Health system and integrated it into its maintenance process.
How 3D Printing Impacts The Maritime Industry
3D printing has penetrated a range of sectors and industries to a point where it is being adopted by mainstream organizations in their manufacturing processes. However, one sector that has been left behind in this adoption is the maritime industry.
There are a stream of applications for 3D printing in the maritime industry, such as product innovation and customization, spare part manufacturing, on-demand manufacturing, and much more.
High-rate, automated aerospace RTM line delivers next-gen spoilers
Spirit’s assessment, which included composite and metallic options, agreed with the benchmarks established by Airbus. RTM of epoxy in carbon fiber meets all of the spoiler’s requirements, including — critically — cost. However, it is not production cost, says Pinner, but system cost, which Spirit was able to reduce by 30%. “The RTM solution was most cost effective from raw material to assembly onto the wing,” he says. The winning solution also was weight-neutral.
Back on the tables, as plies are cut, the ABB robot places them on a stacking station at the end of the row of tables. Here, a video camera performs a quick inspection of each ply. The plies are then sorted and kitted according to their end use — skins, spars, ribs — and then spot welded together, activating a binder in the NCF. Complete kits are next moved by the ABB robot to a stacking plate, which is, basically, a steel tray. On this tray is a QR code that specifies the type of kit it holds, whether upper skin, lower skin, spar or rib. The QR code is scanned by the robot, which logs the kit with a manufacturing execution system (MES), the software that drives the entire spoiler production line.
The MES is a product of ThyssenKrupp (Essen, Germany), the systems integrator that provided some of the manufacturing hardware and material handling equipment Spirit uses. Boyd says the software is off-the-shelf from ThyssenKrupp, but it’s been customized for the spoiler production line to provide Industry 4.0 capability. The MES was written not just to track material status and manufacturing progress throughout the plant, but to guide and prompt operator activity through every step — when to move material from point to point, when to load machines, when to unload machines, etc. “We don’t want an operator to make a move here unless the MES says to make a move,” Boyd notes. Moreover, he says, MES provides full data traceability, which allows Spirit to capture and see full M&P information, from the raw material as it comes in the door to the finished spoiler as it goes out the door.