Precision Spring Europa Spa (PSE) is an important company that produces stop and safety rings, elastic bands, sheared parts and springs for molds and supplies its products to companies in the automotive and appliances sectors such as SKF, Schaeffler, ZF, Valeo, PSA, Miele and Bosch.

Thanks to the partnerships with these OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturers), it has continuously improved its production and R&D processes, to offer a range of products according to customer specifications with excellent quality, service and price performances. Born in Trezzano Rosa (MI) in 1968 thanks to the will of Luigi Bellazzi, in 1983 it expanded by opening its own commercial and logistics office in Germany. In 2005 his nephews Francesco and Marco Lorenti succeed him as Chairman and Director: their managerial skills and the will to invest even in unfavourable moments have allowed the company to brilliantly overcome the crisis of 2008/2009 and to achieve current size (115 employees in Italy, 15 in Germany) and numbers (20 million euros in turnover, consolidated between the Italian and German offices). Today, thanks to the experience gained during 50 years of activity, PSE is to be considered one of the reference producers in the sector.

The fundamental production processes such as rolling, winding, grinding and welding take place within the company, while the activities with a low percentage of added value (galvanizing, packaging) are entrusted to

BUSINESS CASE

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SECTOR

Manufacturing

CASE STUDY

PRECISION SPRING EUROPA UP SOLUTIONS

subcontractors. The logistical aspect is also handled by PSE: partly from the Italian office and partly from the German one (given the massive presence on site of companies in the automotive sector), which also deals with sorting in neighbouring countries and manages the supply chain through the Kanban method.

A DETERMINING CONSCIOUSNESS

Anyone who finds himself having to manage a production company in today’s demanding context, knows that it is necessary to plan investments in the technological field to better meet the demands of an increasingly selective clientele. For PSE, the need of the Supply Chain Manager to make all the staff aware - from production to management - of the real level of performance of the production department, was decisive for the choice of the technological tools on which to focus in order to become more performing. The possibility of benefiting from the measures of the Industry 4.0 Government Plan (special provision of the Italian Government) then provided PSE with a further input to start the search for a reliable partner, capable of increasing the company’s technological level through a digitization and production optimization system. PSE contacted several players in the IT sector and chose among them the one that provided it with valid design consultancy, an efficient ERP and a MES system capable of interfacing both with the selected ERP and with the various types of machines present in its shopfloor. It was thus that PSE entrusted Retelit group with the task of collaborating on an automation project of its own production and the subsequent implementation of the just monitoring module, part of the just mes suite.

BENEFITS ACHIEVED AND FUTURE TARGETS FOR PSE

After having chosen Up Solutions as a partner and having studied a Project Plan together, it entered the “live” phase in 2017 on one of the automotive production lines consisting of 25 machines including rolling mills and winding machines

Given that the needs identified by PSE were - first and foremost - those of detecting the inefficiencies of production yields and updating the rolling cycle times (e.g.: need to identify the correct times for the hank change to replan the expected duration of such specific activity) to optimize the productivity of work shifts, the main parameters that Just Monitoring is managing are:

THE COMPANY

Location: Italy, Germany

Typology: Private

Web site: www.pse-group.it

Dimension: 130 employees

- PRODUCTIVITY (processing speed);

- YIELD (hours of “run” and “stop” measured over time);

- OEE (total effectiveness of the plant).

What are these two data monitoring? If the two parameters are similar, it means that you are maintaining a correct processing speed and, in terms of work planning, you have reached an optimal organization. From the moment PSE has started to use just monitoring to date, it has already been able to notice the improvement in yields of + 10%. This was possible because just monitoring allows to identify - in real time - the inefficiencies of a specific machine by displaying different colours on the PC touch screens positioned next to it, immediately making the necessary changes: all this, in addition, makes the machine operator conscious of the real performance he is generating, stimulating him for improvement.

Thanks to the pre-installation training and continuous technical assistance provided by Up Solutions, PSE can now determine cycle times more reliably and, through the reporting generated by the system (useful for evaluating the productivity of the machines, by reporting any deviations from the required parameters) is able to identify the best performing machine-product combinations and better plan shifts with a positive impact on staff management.

Given the benefits obtained using even a single software of the just mes suite, the company is evaluating the possibility of installing the just plm and just planning modules. These will facilitate the development of new products and the management and sharing of technical data between multiple departments by eliminating paper documents (just plm) and will help plan the production of one or more lines, optimizing performance.

“Just mes made all the staff, from production to management, aware of the real level of

production yield.”Edmondo Facchinetti - Plant Manager

Up Solutions Srl – Gruppo Retelit