QMW's Project Development
Up until four years ago, QMW executed all engineering designs using 2D AutoCAD. Following intense strategic planning and market research, QMW decided to add Engineering Services to their Product and Service portfolio and in so doing, strengthen their market leadership.
Several 3D CAD Packages were evaluated, including Autodesk Inventor, and all were rated with respect to certain key metrics such as licence affordability, functionality, 'on site' service, training and resource pool.
Autodesk Inventor was chosen as the 'weapon of choice' for the Engineering Department - the rest is history!
QMW Project Review
As part of their strategic vision, QMW are continually prospecting for key partnerships in the global mining industry and related services sector.
A tradeshow meeting in South America between QMW's Marketing Manager and NHL or "North Haulage Ltd" of Inner Mongolia in 2008, has now realised a new integrated ROPS and FOPS Cabin Design Project for QMW Industries. The new design is for NHL's TR100 Rigid Body Dump truck, a 100 tonne piece of capital plant equipment, and the new design is part of NHL's strategic requirement to grow market share throughout Asia, specifically Australia, and the rest of the world.
The new integrated ROPS and FOPS Cabin design project is aimed at replacing a very out dated non ROPS and FOBS Cabin with a cutting edge new design, including best in class visibility, in cab noise levels, ergonomics and HVAC, and including the latest in automotive styling cues for both the interior and exterior, all protected by an integrated ROPS and FOPS structure to ISO 3471 and ISO 3449, a pre requisite for mining in the modern world.
This may seem a little over the top for the operator enclosure of a piece of plant, but as all business owners know, the longer an operator is comfortable and happy, the less fatigued he is, the more tonnage he moves, the better the 'bottom line' performance on the P & L!
The Challenge
Through negotiation, the agreement with NHL was that the complete project would be delivered and in production within a 12 month timeframe, no mean feat for a new state of the art operator enclosure.
NHL requested that several 'Customer Improvements' be included in the redesign and that there were to be minimal engineering changes to the rest of the macine, with the adoption of several of their current key cabin components, namely the steering column, pedals, switchgear, displays, controls, and seats, a request that at first QMW thought may dilute the new design.
Also thrown into the challenge was the fact that there was a language barrier, QMW had no Chinese speaking employees and NHL's translators had little engineering experience! This, combined with the fact that there was incomplete 20 year old legacy 2D and 3D CAD data meant the execution of the project had to be structured and very efficient.
The Solution
The decision was made to conduct all communications through all phases of QMW's "New Product Introduction Process" as graphically as possible, with Autodesk Inventor dovetailing seamlessly into QMW's NPIP program.
Following a trip to NHL all key engineering inputs were detailed and all of the 'hard points' and allowable machine changes agreed. From this, QMW generated a 'footprint' in the CAD environment from which to work from, and then set about conceptual phase, a new industry leading Cabin for NHL.
The Result
QMW have been successful in developing a state of the art design, presentation and manufacturing process package utilising Autodesk software. With conceptual development undertaken utilising sketchbook and Inventor and all presentation materials supplied solely out of Autodesk Showcase and Autodesk Publisher we have been able to streamline the entire process from inception to reality.
The difficulties of language barriers have been overcome with realistic visual representations to present our concept, design, evaluation and manufacturing processes to give our client confidence in QMW delivering a right first time, innovative state of the art product on time.
Without Autodesk and our partners ADA CADPartners we would not have had the opportunity to develop in to a globally recognised design house.
More about QMW
here.