Case Study: Drilling Systems

The Customer approached Glassline with a need to improve their drilling system throughput. They had at the time two Polar style drills, which rotate the part for each drilling cycle, and can only drill one hole at a time. A layout was developed which included two XY Style machines. Each of the machines incorporated a Y-axis table, and two drilling machines which could move laterally in the X-axis, independent from one another. Therefore, it was possible to drill two holes at once. The full system included entry and exit conveyor lines, and automatic loading/unloading vacuum arms, which would load and unload parts to/from the drill at the same time, further decreasing cycle time. Software allowed for parts to flow to either of the drilling systems, in a parallel-style flow, or to have the parts flow through both drilling machines in a series flow style.