Calumet chooses FASTechnologies' Drill Automation Software

Calumet, MI Calumet Electronics announces that it has installed FASTechnologies' Drill Automation Software. Calumet chose SmartParts software to improve productivity, quality, and reliability. SmartParts' single download feature allows each machine to get cassette information and the job data with a single download, and allows for a hands-off operator setup. SmartParts optimizes manufacturing cycle time and ensures that every job is drilled correctly.

About Calumet Electronics

Calumet Electronics has been setting the standard of excellence for printed circuit boards since 1968. Proudly built in the USA, all production is done in house in the security of our North American facility. The Quality System is registered to IS09001:2000 and certified by the Department of Defense to the Military Performance Specification for Printed Circuit Boards-, MIL­PRF-31032. Calumet Electronics is also a certified HUBZone Small Business by the SBA

Sanmina-SCI Installs FASTechnologies' Suite of Drill Room Automation Software

The company's Owego, New York, factory experiences dramatic efficiency improvements in drill room output.

Big Lake, Minn., USA--FASTechnologies has sold and installed new automation software at Sanmina's Owego PCB facility helping to drive efficiencies in their drill room operations. The software installed includes, UltraServer, SmartParts classics, SmartParts Monitoring and SmartParts Cassetting. The company has been able to substantially increase drill room output since installing the combined drill room software system.

"We are very pleased with the performance of FASTechnologies' software. We have experienced an 8% improvement in drill room output, a 14% scrap reduction from the drilling dept., and significant cost savings enabled by the rules-driven system for selective hit count adjustment " said Alex Stepinski - Sanmina-SCI Owego Engineering Manager

Endicott Interconnect Technologies install SmartPartsMonitoring

FASTechnologies, Corp., and Endicott Interconnect Technologies are pleased to announce the installation of a DNC system and SmartParts Monitoring Server, a web-based drill and router monitoring system at Endicott facility.

The system delivers NC part program information in the most reliable way and uploads machine status back to storage and analysis. “The system has replaced an old system that was not able to serve more then 3 machines at the same time without freezing” said Kevin Haughan from Endicott Interconnect Technologies, “The system also allows us to eliminate the dry run of part programs which save a substantial amount of time per job” continued Kevin. The system provides a real-time company-wide internal web site with pages showing the current status of every drilling and routing machine. Developed for lean manufacturing, this "heads up" display saves operator time by guiding operators directly to machines, which have stopped and need attention.

The status information is collected from ESI (Sieb & Meyer controller) and Excellon drill machines, and sent to the FASTechnologies UltraServer for storage and analysis. Detailed reports are then available to company process engineers and managers, allowing them to analyze productivity and identify problems. The reports include machine utilization, machine and operator errors, job tracking, and summaries.

"This system pays for itself quickly by saving a few minutes of machine time every day" said Ofer Ton, FASTechnologies President. "Face it, save only ten minutes a day on each of machine, and that's sixteen hours of added drilling time every day. At that rate, the system payback is about four months, with an investment return of nearly 250% annually. How many capital investments pay off like that these days?"

He went on, "The information collected by the system was never available before. Every single event that is happening on any given machine is being logged and tracked for future use. The monitoring product will be integrated into FASTechnologies latest paging product line, in which the system can either send a page to a physical pager or an email notification when machines stop."

The SmartParts Monitoring Server is available exclusively from FASTechnologies, Corp.