A380 a new challenge for digital manufacturing

Following the past, already not so recent events, of 11 September in New York City, the commercial aviation market at the global level has been greatly resentful. However there is one aspect that has remained practically alterations downwards, in any case to the contrary: the design of manufacturing processes.

Within the broad spectrum that includes the aviation market, if we are left only with the construction companies of aircraft, times of crisis are determined by a reduction in requests from business units by air carriers, the rise of contributions to risk and a drastic reduction in manufacturing costs. This last aspect is what determines the even more urgent need for new systems to verify and optimize manufacturing methods before the release of the productive process.
One of the most representative of the current situation is the manufacture of the new Airbus model: 380, the large aircraft for passenger of the twenty-first century. Regardless of that there is a backlog of greater or lesser dimension, the phase in which the construction company is located at the moment is the design of the aircraft and its components manufacturing processes.
Airbus is one of the great companies of the aerospace environment, with some 45,000 workers, mainly located in France, Germany, Great Britain, and Spain. This separation in countries significantly increases the need for integration of the structures in a common database.
The A380 has scheduled its first flight at end of 2004 and scheduled delivery at the beginning of 2006.

The phase in which is in these moments Airbus
It is the design of the aircraft and its components manufacturing processes

Airbus is one of the great companies of the aerospace environment, with some 45,000 workers, mainly located in France, Germany, Great Britain, and Spain. This separation in countries significantly increases the need for integration of the structures in a common database

At the end of the year 2000 Airbus and IBM signed an agreement to ensure that the development of the new Airbus was made with the PLM (Product Life Management), tools of Dassault Systems, - Catia - Enovia - Delmia, this being an important jump on the tools used to date. This has required a major effort from all those companies, such as Abgam, working a servicing both the manufacturer and to the entire chain of suppliers.
The concept of Virtual Factory to work with this giant of the sky, 80 metres long, 80-meter wingspan and 25 meters in height, requires numerous platforms of montage, cinematic, design of new plants, assemblies, ergonomic studies... etc. Are they put in place the new integrated products in philosophy PLM, Catia for design and control numeric and above all the pertaining to the Digital manufacturing (FD), covered in Delmia. In these recent has been working among the various subsidiaries of Delmia in France, Germany and United Kingdom, supplemented in Spain by Abgam, (Distributor Delmia), and the different floors of Airbus, coordinating efforts on specific projects assigned by countries. It is remarkable that in all these centres, the first installations of FD Delmia were executed in Spain.
As a Process Engineer products have been adapted by teams of both companies and installed in Hamburg Airbus.
Abgam FD team has worked from the beginning of the year 2000, jointly with the subsidiaries Delmia France, Germany and United Kingdom, in projects relating to the Airbus to participate in the coordination of the same.
Airbus Spain, Abgam made all services for installation, training and collaboration in projects carried out in Spain. Their collaboration in the area of Digital manufacturing with EADS, also extends to other divisions as military transport and space.
"The diversity of disciplines makes us have specialists in different areas, Catia design and NC V5 VPM, robotics, ergonomics, Assembly, Virtual numerical Control, Process Engineer, analysis of flows, developments to connect the virtual and real world, and especially the integration of all these products"using the same database. This has meant a huge investment in personnel and training to get to this point, in which we can say that we are one of the best prepared teams in Europe, having been installed in other European countries solutions developed in Abgam/FD", and possessing own know-how in this area". -Says Jaime Muñoz, Director of the Fund Department in Abgam.

The pieces that compose the aircraft are extremely complex and require mechanised until 5 axles in machines that employ new technologies and new procedures for the mechanised.

The methodologies to employ are specific, what carries to companies like Abgam to supply to the manufacturer and to his providers the necessary applications to fulfil these specifications and improve the current performances so much for the applications of design as of mechanised and of simulation.

A team of specialists in Abgam/FD develops new postprocesadores to measure, fulfilling the requirements of the final customer (Airbus), creation of the APT, integration in Catia V5, automatic creation of the documentation, IT (Instructions of Work), integration with CNC, with VNC (Virtual Numerical Control), and with IGRIP, for the cases in that they require postprocesados after realising corrections during the simulation of the process.

The power of new modules of mechanised in Catia, Mechanised Prismatic (PMG), employed in 2 axles and half, Mechanised of Surfaces (SMG) for 3 axles including functionalities for machines tool of high speed, and the new module of 5 axles (AMG) created specifically to solve all the problems of the mechanised aeronautical sector component manufacturing sector component manufacturing that include functionalities from 2 axles and half until 5 axles with all the necessary included. 

The A380 has
provided its first
flight to end of the
2004 and is scheduled
delivery to
early in 2006

Examples of integration in the problems of Aeronautics machining with new machine tools, we can point out the following projects:

Robots Tricepts: the experience of Abgam in integrating applications of robots with utilities of machining thanks to the use of software programming and simulation IGRIP in conjunction with the modules of CATIA V5 machining and special developments made by this company.

Application of drilling and reaming for a cell of Airbus is integrated in the case described here. It also integrates the possibility of making a simulation with other Delmia software focused to the ergonomic analysis and montabilidad of aerostructures.
In this cell the movements of the robot will be scheduled with Catia V5 in 5-axis and subsequently are postprocesará for a Siemens 840 d control. Igrip will later be used to simulate and analyze possible collisions or errors and optimize the movements of the auxiliary axes of the cell.

Simulation of machine tool of great complexity. In this case is to create a virtual machine to perform the simulation of an integrated system for machining 2 CNC 5-axis, one of them controls a machine 5-axis Gantry and the other a system for carbon fiber parts.

We carry out the adaptation of the functions of the controls to simulate the movements of the machine and prevent programming errors, check the validity of the different designed tooling and errors of the postprocessor.

"Our team undertakes consultancies analyzing current situations, advising and providing solutions for integration in new acquisitions of machine tools and develop what is necessary for this integration, so eat the formation of our customers." "Our objective is to make the machining, for complex that they are, effectively and at the lowest possible cost, and for this we use the tools integrated in the PLM solution," says Irrintzi Larrañaga, responsible for North Carolina in the Department of Abgam Fund.

In July of the year 2000, Airbus and Dassault Systemes announced the agreement whereby Airbus agreed to the purchase of the products of Dassault Systemes software of design and manufacturing. Within this agreement, the incorporation of 2500 jobs Dassault Systemes solutions is planned.
It is expected that the first A380 delivered in early 2006.

See also...

• Impact on suppliers