Erich Bachmann is Vice President Product Management at Komax. He will talk about key technologies which enable highly automated harness production and how the process quality can be ensured.

Requirements put on the company are: Flexibility with a wide range of solutions, productivity with quality AND throughput, traceability with broad access to production data, consistency with robust processes/proven quality as well as reliability, meaning lifetime support and spare parts.

To answer these requirements Komax Wire invests each year around seven to eight percent of their turnover into innovation.

Paul Knecht

Smedla roughly explains how their automation software analyzer works:
First there is inbound data which can contain 3d, 2d and schematic information. These data can be stored in a KBL file and are enriched with further information, e.g. availability.
The automation software analyzer then merges further knowledge with this data. The further knowledge might for example be the location of a plug within the wiring harness.

The analyzer then reports a simple number – the level of how easy it is to automize the part. The report also shows roadblockers and missing information. These newly built information are then again stored in the database. Thus the system collects more and more data as it is used.

Paul Knecht

Michael Smedla (Manager Product Development) from NEXANS AUTOELECTRIC talks about the setup needed for the digital development process and digitization of the process chain.

In order to adapt the development process for the wire harness, NEXANS created a couple of tools. One of those tools is an automation software analyzer. Smedla explains: „We used to rely on humans and their knowledge when it comes to automatization.“ Most knowledge was bound to single employers. This was prone to error and not very sustainable.

Paul Knecht