Pro-face Uses Industrial Computer To Adapt To Changes In Production

Increasing information on diversified production makes our previous hard drives overwhelming, and system upgrade becomes more and more urgent.IPC

At Kotobukiya's factory, we see assembly lines continually producing carpets long enough to cover the entire chassis of cars.IPC Mr. Hisao Kadoi, responsible for system improvement, introduced that:“These carpets are not only large, but also thicker and thicker than before, mainly in order to prevent the noise of the car engine from entering Pro-face in the carriage. ”

Mr. Kadoi explained that:“Because the carpet is thicker, we need to upgrade the system to get production data Pro-face thicker carpet means that the number of carpets we ship out of the factory each time decreases, so we need to reduce the number of each production unit Pro-face correspondingly. At the same time, the increase of product types requires us to change the producer. Style. Therefore, we need to set up production lines more frequently and reduce the number of production units.”

About seven years ago, Kotobukiya installed Hitachi's HIP POP production information collection system to deliver production data, such as output, defective product information and production line running time, to production managers'computers. However, because the output of various products varies greatly with the type, the data collected by HIP POP system increases rapidly, and ultimately exceeds its hard disk capacity. Because the hard disk can not store the data generated every day, the loss of data occurs from time to time, which prompted Kotobukiya to establish a new information acquisition system.

“We regret to find that we need a more flexible system that can adapt to changes in production.”

Before setting up the new system, Kotobukiya solicited the opinions of each of the participating producers. Grass-roots workers reflect that they need better ways to input data, while management needs better search capabilities so that they can use more search conditions to complete more advanced information search. These opinions indicate that the new system needs to respond flexibly to changes in production conditions.

The carpet workshop used to install the system is filled with fibre dust and everyone has to wear a mask. This raises the question of whether multipurpose personal computers can work reliably in this environment. Recalling that the best system for this environment was selected, Mr. Kadoi said:“We appreciate the versatility of multipurpose personal computers, but we know that only factory-specific systems can work safely in such an environment.

Kotobukiya eventually chose Pro-face's reliable industrial tablet computer.

Industrial tablet computers are specially designed for industrial production, so they can withstand some particularly harsh environments, such as chemical fiber dust in the air, and solve the problem of insufficient hard disk capacity. We only need some basic knowledge of VB, we can easily meet our needs, and even if the production environment changes frequently, the system can still cope with it freely. After we installed a demo program, we were impressed by the large and clear screen and high-speed processing capability of the system, and it was also popular in the basic production line. These reasons eventually led us to choose Pro-face, an industrial tablet computer.

After continuous discussions with the production department, Kotobukiya has established this system, which can provide much more detailed information than the equipment used before. For example, when there is a problem in the production line, the operator can select one of the 35 error codes as the cause of the error input system; similarly, one of the 13 codes can be used to determine the cause of the production line stoppage. The system can transmit the field information to the manager's computer in detail and real-time, which can not only show the problems of production line as before, but also provide the detailed reasons for these problems. Therefore, operators can take timely and appropriate actions to correct them.

Adding functionality to further improve system performance and move towards better information delivery.

Kotobukiya has set up a wireless local area network (WLAN) to better use the system. Mr. Kadoi said:“In some production lines, we have to change their layout two or three times a day. So canceling all cables saves us a lot of time to rewire. In this regard, WLAN is very effective. In the future, we will add a notice function to the screen used by the workers on the production line, and further modify the system so that the operators can see the production process displayed graphically.” Kotobukiya also plans to expand the system's capabilities in receiving and transmitting information. All in all, Kotobukiya has high expectations for the versatility and flexibility of these industrial tablet computers.