The National Center for Manufacturing Sciences (NCMS) today announced that its Volumetric Accuracy for Large Machine Tools (VALMT) project has been honored with a R&D 100 Award. VALMT, which pioneered an innovative process in volumetric error compensation for large machine tools, is the fifth R&D 100 Award NCMS has received. Widely recognized as the "Oscars of Innovation," the annual R&D 100 Awards honor excellence in high technology products.

 "VALMT will save ship and aircraft manufacturers millions of dollars," said NCMS Vice President Chuck Ryan. "Machine tool calibrations used to take an entire week, with VALMT the same process can be performed in a day. The benefits of this technology aren’t just time savings; it will allow for more accurate parts, reducing or eliminating expensive re-work during assembly."

Learn More About VALMT- Podcast  VALMT Awards and Articles

The NCMS Collaborative R&D Process teamed private industry (Automated Precision Inc., The Boeing Corporation, Siemens Energy and Automation and MAG Cincinnati Machine, LLC) and the Department of Defense (U.S. Air Force Logistics Center, Naval Foundry and Propeller Center, U.S. Navy Fleet Readiness Center East, and the U.S. Army Anniston Depot) for the VALMT project, quickly developing the groundbreaking technology affordably, and with less risk than alternative “go it alone” R&D methods.

“The secret to the success of NCMS R&D is collaboration,” said NCMS President & CEO Rick Jarman. “Collaboration maximizes benefits and reduces risk and cost. This award is the latest validation that the NCMS collaborative model works.”

Winners of the R&D 100 Awards are selected by an independent judging panel and the editors of R&D Magazine. The publication and its online portal serve research scientists, engineers, and other technical staff members at high tech industrial companies and public and private laboratories around the world.

R&D 100 is not the only award to honor VALMT: the technology also received a coveted Defense Manufacturing Excellence Award for outstanding cooperative efforts on technology development between government, industry and academia (the seventh for NCMS). Northrop-Grumman recently selected VALMT to improve accuracies on their large-volume machine tools used for production of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.

Laser Removal in Action (WMV)

This robotic laser stripping system is capable of removing paint from a CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter blade in less than two hours – a time savings of 75% over hand-sanding. The laser system is so precise that it can remove only the top layers of paint, leaving the primer layer intact and not damaging the blade substrate.  When it was done by hand, technicians wore hazmat suits and worked in sweltering heat with toxic stripping chemicals.  Even a small mistake could result in irreparable damage to a $110,000 helicopter blade. This elegant laser system removes that risk. It’s going to save the Department of Defense about 80% in blade refurbishing costs, not to mention the huge time savings.

For more information about this project please contact Phil Callihan, NCMS Executive Director of Communications, at (734) 995-2046 or email philc@ncms.org.

The following CTMA projects were recently approved:

Corrosion Resistant Solid State Thin-Walled Component Joining for Maintenance and Repair Applications

This project is specifically targeting one of the more challenging classes of weld repair and fabrication – thin-walled components.  Thin-walled components often require the use of the highest skilled welding artisans within the depot infrastructure due to the intricate nature of avoiding burn through and component thermal warping.  To avoid this, thin-walled components (common in nearly every military platform) are often over-engineered or buttressed with thicker metal reinforcements.  These countermeasures add significant unwanted weight to the platform and also increase the corrosion prone weld filler regions that results from conventional welding.  This project seeks to develop and test a new solid state joining method that does not melt the materials to be joined thus increasing dimensional accuracy, corrosion resistance, and weld cycle time.

The new state-of-the-art technology to be explored in this project stems from the use of a novel manufacturing method called Deformation Resistance Welding (DRW), which can be utilized to join a wide variety of thin-walled components common to virtually every DoD platform.  Further, the DRW technology can be readily retrofitted into any depot facility for rapid utilization as the fundamental technology is based upon the well-known principles of resistance spot welding yet applied to large components of many shapes and sizes.

Improved Stealth and Lower Cost Operations for U.S. Naval Ships using High-Performance Cordage Deck Edge Netting

The U.S. Navy uses two styles of deck edge netting:  metallic cord netting that is durable but very heavy and difficult to repair shipboard as well as add to a ship’s radar cross section.  The other netting that is used is nylon netting that is lightweight and has no radar signature but need to replaced every 18 to 24 months due to UV degradation, shrinkage and abrasion.  This project will evaluate a new cordage net that is lightweight, has no radar signature and has a Navy tested life of five years. This netting is machine-made and promises reduced lifecycle cost. 

On 28 – 29 April, FRC East hosted a Technology Showcase sponsored by the National Center for Manufacturing Sciences (NCMS) through its Commercial Technologies for Maintenance Activities program (CTMA).  The showcase brought leading technology companies into FRC East to see first hand the challenges our maintainers face in order to identify innovative commercial solutions.

The Technology Showcase opened with Col. Loch providing an overview of FRC East operations and Mr. Greg Kilchenstein from OSD’s Maintenance Policy and Programs office providing an overview of maintenance technology’s role in DoD’s overarching strategy and he outlined the Commercial Technologies for Maintenance Activities program as proven technology transition venue.  NCMS member companies were given a comprehensive tour of FRC East operations and facilities.  Next on the agenda were table top displays, strategically located throughout the depot to ensure easy access for all base personnel to see the technologies  The table top displays provided industry representatives a unique opportunity to learn about challenges faced directly by the maintainers.  The first day concluded with a networking event at the “The Pitt.”  The second day was dedicated to one-on-one industry presentations with base personnel regarding solutions with immediate potential for deployment at FRC East.

The Technology Showcase was a powerful example of how the CTMA Program fast tracks innovative technical solutions from private industry directly into the hands of DoD personnel to increase systems availability while reducing cost.

NCMS members displaying technology included DIT-MCO International, Aging Aircraft Consulting, LLC, Superior Controls, iMAST/ARL (Penn State), Stratasys, Eclypse International, Adapt Laser Systems, Automated Precision, Inc., Aerowing, Imaginestics, LLC, Spatial Integrated Systems, Inc.,  Spectro Inc., GSA Service Company,  POM Group, REI Systems, Inc., and Pendaran Inc.,

Three CTMA projects have been formed to immediately meet FRC East needs:

• Wiring Shop Modernization - upgrade the capability to build and test wiring harnesses, currently very labor and time intensive.
• Automated Robotic Blade Stripping System (ARBSS) - Provide a reliability upgrade and training.  In addition, assess the challenges for wider deployment of automated paint stripping technology.
• Large Area Inspection of Composite Parts- evaluate and identify improved methods for detecting damage to composite aircraft components.

The Commercial Technologies for Maintenance Activities (CTMA) Program is collaboration between the National Center for Manufacturing Sciences, its member companies, and the Department of Defense (DoD).  Under an historic Cooperative Agreement between NCMS and the OSD Office for Maintenance Policy and Programs,, NCMS and its member companies co-sponsor technology development, deployment and validation with DoD organic maintenance activities.  The current focus is the use of maintenance related technologies to reduce the costs associated with maintenance and rebuild of weapons systems as an element of the overall DoD maintenance strategy.

By partnering with NCMS government services members, the organic DoD maintenance activities are able to quickly assess the benefits of new manufacturing technologies in their own facilities, working side-by-side with industry leaders solving manufacturing problems through collaboration.

NCMS is the largest cross-industry collaborative research and development consortium in North America, and is the only consortium in the U.S. devoted exclusively to maintenance technologies, processes and practices. NCMS has nearly 25 years of experience in the formation and management of complex, multi-partner collaborative R&D programs, and is backed by corporate members representing virtually every manufacturing sector.

The next Technology Showcase will be 8 – 9 June at the Marine Corps Logistics Base, Albany Maintenance Center in Albany, Georgia.

Please plan to participate in our next Technology Showcase.

DATE:            June 8-9, 2010

LOCATION:    Marine Corps Logistics Base, Albany Maintenance Center, Albany, Georgia.

REGISTRATION

This is an exclusive opportunity for NCMS members to display technologies for managers, engineers, and artisans at the Marine Corps Logistics Base, Albany Maintenance Center, Albany, Georgia.

• Reverse Engineering capabilities 
• Corrosion Prevention technologies 
• Training 
• Data management 
• Fluid analysis for field and FARM applications 
• Automation Technologies 
• Technologies to reduce water usage 
• Technologies to reduce or reuse waste streams 
• Technologies that will reduce energy usage or provide renewable capabilities
• Embedded technologies/predictive maintenance capabilities 
• Advanced surface repair equipment
• Lasers 
• Upgraded CNC equipment 
• Plant equipment management tools (CFAMs) 
• Heat treating capabilities. 
• Hardening (Case), carburization, artificial aging of aluminum, stress relief/stabilization, annealing, etc.  

Aerospace Engineering & Manufacturing Magazine has a great article highlighting the success of the award-winning NCMS-CTMA Volumetric Accuracy for Large Machine Tools (VALMT) project.

...One of the most vexing catch-22s in large-part machining appears to have finally been caught. Rapid volumetric compensation for high accuracy in large-scale five-axis machining is now within the grasp of the manufacturing community.

Why is this significant? Large components are often painstakingly crafted from numerous smaller components because the best machining technologies are not accurate enough to achieve the tight tolerances on large monolithic parts that could reduce part count and assembly time

...A joint project of the National Center for Manufacturing Sciences called Volumetric Accuracy for Large Machine Tools (VALMT)—involving Mag Industrial Automation Systems, Automated PrecisionInc. (API), Boeing, and Siemens—recently completed development of a rapid, and hence game-changing, approach to volumetric error compensation. Created especially for large and multi-axis machines, the system achieves the goals set by the design consortium: to reduce the downtime needed to determine necessary volumetric compensations from weeks to a day or less via a simple automated process that improves a machine tool’s volumetric performance by 50% or more.

Full Article

VALMT Podcast

REGISTER NOW! 
You have until COB Wednesday 4/21
to sign-up for our third Technology Showcase
FRC East, 28-29 April, 2010.

Please plan to participate in the third Technology Showcase to be held April 28-29, 2010.

This is an exclusive opportunity for NCMS members to display technologies for managers, engineers, and artisans at the Fleet Readiness Center (FRC) East Maintenance Center in Cherry Point, North Carolina. The first day of the event will be for technology displays followed by a day of follow-up meetings with FRC personnel on potential applications.

FRC East is currently interested in the following technologies:

• Cleaning
• Data Collection Management
• Non-Destructive Inspection
• Dimensional Measurement
• Stripping/Coating Removal
• Coating/Plating Technologies
• Direct Digital Manufacturing
• Surface Finishing
• Analysis
• Composites

For more information please contact:

NCMS Program Manager Debbie Lilu, debral@ncms.org (734) 995-7038. 

Photos from the 2010 Commercial Technologies for Maintenance Activities Symposium.