BY JAYASHREE MENDES MANUFACTURERS OF HEAVY ENGINEERING EQUIPMENT ARE GETTING MORE VERSATILE AS THEY EYE BIGGER OPPORTUNITIES
THE HEAVY ENGINEERING MANUFACTURING industry is seeing much development around automation, building systems, and building total solutions. Importantly, product design cycle times are also changing. Additive manufacturing, PLM solutions, precision in the products manufactured are the key drive for acceptance in this industry. The globally competitive
scenario has made it imperative for companies in the heavy engineering equipment manufacturing space to introduce greater degrees of reliability in the products manufactured.
At a time when manufacturing for aerospace and defence are getting increasingly competitive, other sectors such as petrochemical plants, natural gas processing, LNG plants, hydrogen and synthesis gas plants and polyolefin plants are the mainstay of heavy engineering manufacturing of any country. Amit Bhingurde, chief operations officer, TAL Manufacturing
Solutions, says, “Product development has become highly intricate and complex and involves numerous activities across multiple functions. What is even more challenging is that product development has to be achieved at low cost. Product lifecycle management (PLM) has brought about significant changes in the functioning of the heavy engineering industry,
and thus make it possible for us to achieve our objectives. Earlier before PLM came into existence, the heavy engineering industry relied on manual drawing boards, and there was much documentation that was not only unreliable but also prone to errors.”
Recently, TAL Manufacturing Solutions, a 100% subsidiary of auto major Tata Motors, has developed a totally indigenously-built robot, ‘Brabo’. The company has a production capacity of 10,000 robots per year. He says, “Brabo is totally indigenously developed. Even the controller has been developed locally, by our own team. We are proud to say that almost
95% of the components are indigenous. That means, that it will have low cost of maintenance. Spares will be totally available locally. It is easy to use, and easy to programme control.” Bhingurde has been the key constituent behind the development of Brabo.
ANOTHER COMPANY THAT is eyeing big-ticket investment opportunities in aersopace and defence is engineering giant Larsen & Toubro who sees huge scope in areas like submarines, nuclear power equipment and artillery guns. Speaking on the sidelines of the Make in India Week, Jayant Patil, senior vice president & head, defence & aerospace, Larsen &
Toubro, said that a small investment of Rs 10 crore had later bloomed into a Rs 15,000 crore partnership with ISRO. “In aerospace we have helped build motor casings, divergent nozzles and convergent nozzles for launch vehicles, and for satellite parts we have built deck panels, gas bottles and solar array deploy mechanicals. Our manufacturing technologies use autoclave curing, tape/filament winding, matched die moulding, resin transfer moulding (VARTM, RIM), bonding of metal to composite sections, etc.”
Precision manufacturing requires exacting and rapidly growing demands of the industries it caters to. For instance, Larsen & Toubro’s Precision Manufacturing Facility (PMF) at Coimbatore has a capability spectrum that includes design, engineering methods & processes; precision machining; precision fabrication; special processes – welding, heat treatment, surface
treatment; assembly integration and testing; and supply chain management for defence and aerospace.
The facility, spread over three shops (of 4,000m2 each) specialises in precision fabrication and machining and houses resources for executing heat treatments specially designed for aerospace and defence requirements, various surface treatments including anodising for titanium & aluminium, electro plating for steels, chemical conversion coatings like phosphatising,
chromatising, and passivation. It also has capabilities for precision sheet metal fabrication, manual and automated welding of exotic materials like titanium, aluminium and wide variety of steels.
MACHINING IS AN important part of any precision manufacturing. All companies that are involved in heavy engineering equipment manufacturing maintain a state-of-the-art machine shop with a wide variety of machines including 3-axis & 5-axis CNC machining centres, turn mills, 5 axis Mill turn centres, VTLs, EDMs and wire cutting machines. It will also be aided by a conventional machine shop with an array of lathes, milling machines, shapers, grinding machines and drilling machines.
“Automation is no longer an aspiration, it is a necessity. So we need to be prepared and as an industry; we are not only trying to exploit an emerging opportunity but are also trying to support the development of that,” Bhingurde said.
At the heart of every machining for heavy engineering equipment is the need to to pay attention to incycle machining productivity that will help obtain efficiency improvements outside of the machining cycle. The answer is to find cost savings far outside the machining cycle and even far outside the routine steps in a part’s workflow. What are the inefficiencies that do not occur every time a part is run but still occur often enough to impose a cost?
In terms of replacing manpower with robotics, Sanjeev Sharma, managing director, ABB India, says, “Manpower will always be used. Robotics is not about replacement of the people but is the replacement where working conditions are hazardous to people. In the auto industry, high speed welding is required and since manpower should not be allowed to perform
certain tasks, robotics are used. Safety is important. Moreover, in robotics, repeatability of an action is high.”
ONE ENGINEERING COMPANY that has been at the forefront of heavy engineering across various sectors is Linde. For instance, it is, perhaps, the only company, world-wide, that designs, owns and operates hydrogen and synthesis gas plants using its own technology. The company uses its own plant operations flows into plant construction. Its cryogenic equipment (for very low temperatures and liquefaction of helium and hydrogen) is based to a high extent on its own process and manufacturing know-how. Key components such as expansion turbines with dynamic gas bearings or cold compressors,
developed in-house by Linde Kryotechnik, are characterised by high operational reliability and availability.
The equipment is tailored to the individual requirements and specifications of our customers. The competencies and capabilities of Linde Kryotechnik in the area of cryo systems include: Recovery, cleaning, liquefaction and storage of helium and hydrogen; refrigeration in the temperature range from 80K to below 1.5K; industrial-scale helium and hydrogen
liquefaction; successful implementation of cryogenic systems, from project planning through basic and detail engineering to fabrication and testing; and all on-site services for successful start-up of new plant and conduct of performance tests.
The good news in all this is that the central government has decided to grant about Rs 175 crore for Department of Heavy Industry’s scheme titled ‘Enhancement of Global Competitiveness of Indian Capital Goods Sector’. The first project relates to a joint venture between government of India and government of Karnataka. Under this, 500 acres of land has been earmarked for the first of its kind Integrated Machine Tools Park to be set up near the Japanese park in NMIZ, Tumkur. When implemented fully, the park, which will house 117 machine tools units, is expected to double Indian turnover of machine tools to Rs 9,000 crore. With such initiatives, the Indian heavy engineering equipment manufacturing should get a boost and ready to compete more fiercely globally.