Welding system optimised – Productivity increased

RITTERSHAUSEN/HAIGER – Rittal GmbH & Co. KG is one of the world's leading system providers for control cabinets, power distribution, climate control, IT infrastructure as well as software and service. Several systems from the Haiger-based welding specialist, Carl Cloos Schweisstechnik GmbH, are in use on the Rittershausen site. Recently, a project team has optimised one of the production lines which is of vital significance for the entire production. 

At its Rittershausen site, Rittal produces control cabinets for industry – and racks for IT applications – in various designs which form the basis for system solutions. In all, Rittal is operating six Cloos welding systems, including two fully automated production systems. Each of these consists of 15 or 13 chained robots, various manipulators and comprehensive control technology coordinating the production runs. Here, control cabinet frames are welded which may significantly differ in length, width and height. Depending on the production plan, the tools are changed automatically to the required size in each case which is selected from more than 1800 control cabinet types. This is how hundreds of welded control cabinet frames leave each of the two systems per shift.

The chained system consists of a total of 15 robots and is of enormous importance for the entire production.

Continuous improvement in focus

"To provide our customers with control cabinets within 24 hours, the production lines run day and night and even sometimes at weekends", declares Gerhard Puhl-Turian, Initial Production Department Manager at Rittal in Rittershausen. "The systems are of the utmost importance for the entire control cabinet production, as all production control frames are welded here. We therefore place great value on continuous improvement management", emphasises Puhl-Turian.

The control cabinet frames can vary between 400 mm W x 400 mm D x 800 mm H and 1200 mm W x 800 mm D x 2200 mm H.

A project team, consisting of employees of Cloos and Rittal, exactly examined the complex production run and the process technology. On the complex systems, detailed analysis took place in form of video shootings and time measurements of different processes during the production run. During the investigations, particular attention was paid to the following criteria: cycle time, weld seam quality, process safety and rework. In this regard Cloos promised Rittal concrete values for improvement contractually. Also, maintenance and operating equipment costs should be reduced.