IMPROVED EFFICIENCY THANKS TO SYSTEM INTEGRATION

WITH ITS PURCHASE OF A LASER CUTTING SYSTEM, TWO PRESSBRAKES, AND THE BYSOFT 7

SOFTWARE PACKAGE, CZECH-BASED NTS PROMETAL HAS LAID THE FOUNDATIONS FOR

ITS CONTINUED SUCCESS IN THE FIERCELY COMPETITIVE SHEET METAL PROCESSING SECTOR.

THE GOAL-ORIENTED TRAINING OF THE TEAM ENSURES THAT ALL THE BENEFITS OF THE

NEW EQUIPMENT CAN BE MAXIMIZED.

Text: Rudolf Hermann, Photos: David Raub

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THE CUTTING HEAD leaps across the metal sheet in a whimsical dance. A hole here, one there; a straight cut, an indentation, a corner. What results are sheet metal parts of approximately 2.5 meters by 20 centimeters. The machine takes 25 minutes to process one metal sheet; 81 sheets remain, after which a new and probably com pletely dif-ferent order will follow. The machine is a Bystar 3015, the all-rounder in the Bystronic range of laser cutting systems. Soon the sheet metal parts it

is currently cutting will help transport suitcases and bags to where they belong in one of the world’s airports. They are components for a baggage handling system.The Bystar stands in a well-lit hall at NTS Prometal, a company located in the small Czech town of Slavicin, in the picturesque hills of the Moravian- Slovak Beskids. The Czech subsidiary of the Dutch machine manufacturing corporation NTS Group is a typical job shop: Rather than having its own product portfolio, the company only takes orders for the production of individual parts for machines and devices.

COMPLETE MODERNIZATION

“We consider ourselves a one-stop shop for our customers,” CEO of NTS Prometal Otto van Leuven says. “This is why we must be able to do every-thing: cut, process, paint, assemble.” From his office on the upper floor of the administration building, he overlooks a green pasture, where in 2007, the production hall that is home to the Bystar 3015 was built next to the original factory building. NTS Prometal started off in sheet metal processing and metalworking in 1997, with 20 employees. Since then, paint jobs and assembly have been added to the range of services, and the payroll now includes the names of approximately 120 employees.

“ We consider ourselves to be a high-mix and low-volume supplier: that is, a company not geared towards mass production, but which has many capabilities.”

CEO Otto van Leuven, NTS Prometal

Otto van Leuven inspects his new Xpert pressbrake: “Precisely what we required,” says the NTS CEO talking about his new Bystronic equipment.

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One of them is Ilja Cabak, the man at the Bystar 3015. He passes on the cut parts to the pressbrake, where they are bent into the required three- dimensional form. Currently, this is done on an approximately ten-year-old pressbrake from a non- European manufacturer, but this is to change. The comprehensive modernization of NTS Prometal’s machinery involves not only the new Bystar 3015 – which replaced an older model of the same type – but also the purchase of two pressbrakes: an Xpert 200 and an Xcite 80 E. The purchase order was completed using the BySoft 7 software pack-age, which in combination with the three machines, enables a substantial increase in efficiency with regard to work organization and production.“With our old bending machines, the operator has to program the bending process on the machine itself,” Miroslav Micik, Production Manager at NTS Prometal, explains. “This requires a great deal of experience and occupies the machine throughout the entire period during which the initial proto-types are produced. Increasing precision until the specifications are met is achieved through trial and error. And this can be time-consuming. With the Bystronic pressbrakes and the accompanying soft-ware, this process is made more efficient.” Adding to this, CEO Otto van Leuven points out: “Since cutting and bending are now coordinated by a

common software, our production processes are shorter and we can therefore respond more quick-ly to customer requirements. And this in turn im-proves our competitiveness.”According to Production Manager Miroslav Micik, the improved efficiency comes from the fact that many parameters for diverse materials, strengths, and forming alternatives are already prepro-grammed in BySoft 7. Nevertheless, it is still neces-sary to make certain regional fine adjustments, since the quality of steel sheets, for example, can

Ilja Cabak operates the new Bystar, which, in 2013, replaced an older model of the same machine type.

Previous double page: NTS CEO Otto van Leuven (left) and Production Manager Miroslav Micik (right) in conversation with Bystronic salesman Josef Chromy.

NTS Prometal

NTS Prometal Machining s.r.o. is a subsidiary of the globally active Dutch NTS Group. The company was founded in 1997 and is located in Slavicin, a small town in the Moravian-Slovak Beskids in the east of the Czech Republic. NTS Prometal specializes in small series and operates without its own range of products, exclusively on a made-to-order basis for customers. The company employs a staff of approxi-mately 120 and achieved a turnover of 245 million Czech korunas in 2012 (almost 10 million euros).

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vary depending on the supplier. “But once these have been made, it is possible to plan production for the most part at the computer without taking up time on the machine,” Miroslav Micik says. This also allows a wider spectrum of employees to be trained to operate the machines. The manual operation of the old pressbrakes required a good eye and a great deal of experience. Now, with the Bystronic laser cutting system, pressbrake, and software, this task is largely accomplished by the computer.

TRAINING TAKES CENTER STAGE

The computers must be programmed correctly, however. This is the reason Vaclav Kovac and Jan Jurik are in the second factory building, sitting in a small room with windows that overlook the busy hustle and bustle in the older factory hall. But this

is not what the two are interested in. Their atten-tion is focused on the screen on which a beamer is projecting Jan Kratochvil’s training units from his notebook. Jan Kratochvil is a service technician and software instructor at Bystronic Czech Republic. His task this Monday morning is to prepare the two NTS Prometal employees for their work with BySoft 7.“To a large degree, training proceeds according to Bystronic’s standard specifications, but we also respond to the customer’s individual requirements and key areas of focus,” Jan Kratochvil explains. “But at NTS, our training courses largely corre-spond to the standard program.” That is: three days of training for cutting, three for bending and another one to two days for Plant Manager, which is the planning module in BySoft 7. Although the two software technicians from NTS Prometal who Jan Kratochvil is training have their own areas of expertise – one is a cutting expert, the other a bending expert – they should still be able to substi-tute for each other. The software is the secret star of the Bystronic package that NTS Prometal purchased. Which is why the training of the programmers is particularly important. Because only the interplay between the software and the high-performance machines en-ables NTS Prometal to accomplish the gains in effi-ciency that CEO Otto van Leuven wants to achieve with the modernization of his machinery. BySoft 7, for example, allows an optimal layout of the cut parts on the metal sheet to be determined – a feature that minimizes offcuts. The integration of Solidworks, the most widely distributed CAD soft-ware worldwide, is another big plus.

“ To a large degree, training proceeds according to Bystronic’s standard specifications, but we also respond to the customer’s individual requirements and key areas of focus.”

Jan Kratochvil, Bystronic Software Instructor

A typical job shop, NTS Prometal produces parts for quality brands

such as Rolls-Royce and Philips.

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The employees at NTS Prometal are excited about ByVision Bending: Bystronic Service Technician Marek Cicha (right) sets the machine controls.

“EXCELLENT OVERALL PACKAGE” The process of creating cutting and bending pro-grams according to customer-submitted 3D mod-els; continuing with the 2D transformation, through to the processed three-dimensional part: Every-thing is simple and fast with BySoft 7. “This is par-ticularly important in cases when the documenta-tion the customer submits is not precise enough. Which does happen from time to time,” says NTS Prometal’s Deputy CEO Jaromir Kasparek. This is the crux of why NTS Prometal chose the machine and software solution from Switzerland. “For us, Bystronic was simply the perfect fit, the ideal solu-tion,” CEO Otto van Leuven says. “We consider ourselves to be a high-mix and low-volume suppli-er: that is, a company not geared towards mass production, but which has many capabilities. Previ-ously, we invested in our assembly line and our paint shop, now we have followed suit with our

sheet metal processing facilities and have taken a huge step forward.” Production Manager Miroslav Micik allows us even deeper insights into the deci-sion-making process that led to the purchase: Of course NTS Prometal had scrutinized offers from Bystronic’s competitors, and there had indeed been competing products that offered better solu-tions for certain subsets of what was required: “But as an overall package, the combination that Bystronic offers is the best fit for our requirements, particularly thanks to the integrated software package,” he adds, emphatically.Josef Chromy, Bystronic’s Head of Sales for the Czech Republic and Slovakia, is pleased to hear such words. All the more so since companies in eastern central Europe do not necessarily choose Swiss products when there are low-cost alterna-tives. “It is true that with us the initial investment costs are a little higher than with our competitors,”

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Josef Chromy concedes, “but in the long term, our products are more efficient and thus, on the whole, better priced.” According to Chromy, Bystronic usu-ally convinces companies whose owners and man-agement are closely interlinked, as such compa-nies apply long-term thinking. And Josef Chromy emphasizes an additional point: In the sheet metal processing industry, the saying goes that although the salesman sells the custom-er the first machine, it is the service technician who sells any that follow. What he means is: A good product alone is not enough. It is the service sup-port that completes the offer. Miroslav Micik agrees. He looks over to the old pressbrakes and says that they had considered staying with their original supplier. But in the Czech Republic, that manufacturer only has an agent and does not provide a service infrastructure. This had been an additional reason to choose Bystronic.

ROLLS-ROYCE, SIEMENS, PHILIPS

As a job shop without its own range of products, NTS Prometal does not have the opportunity to equip shopwindows or even entire showrooms with spectacular end products and show them off, as electronics or automotive companies can. Nev-ertheless, CEO Otto van Leuven does not miss the chance to take some workpieces from the display cabinet and pass them around. Visitors with a trained eye immediately recognize the quality and precision of the parts: Individual parts from NTS Prometal are used by premium brands, such as Rolls-Royce, Siemens Healthcare or Philips. With the new machines from Bystronic, NTS Prometal wants to ensure that this remains the case.

Stationed in Prague, Rudolf Hermann is a specialized journalist with many years of experience in the east-ern central European region.

“ Since cutting and bending are now coordinated by a common software, our production processes are shorter and we can therefore respond more quickly to customer requirements. And this in turn improves our competitiveness.”

CEO Otto van Leuven, NTS Prometal

Bystronic Software Instructor Jan Kratochvil (above right) trains the NTS software technicians Vaclav Kovac and Jan Jurik – for example about the ByVision Bending control system.