Dizzying proliferation of auto players influences press expansion

Yesterday, Dyson announced plans to launch an electric vehicle. Yes, that’s right, the vacuum manufacturer is throwing its, uh, powertrain in the ring.

After all, if a computer maker, (Apple), a search engine company, (Google), and the entrepreneur of both PayPal and SpaceX can do it, why not the maker of vacuums and fans? Tech corporations that have never manufactured a combustion engine—and probably never will—but have manufactured electrified, computerized machines are making their foray into the vehicular industry left and right.

“There really hasn’t been any other time in the [auto] industry when so many things are in play at the same time," proclaimed David Andrea, Center For Automotive Research, at press OEM Schuler’s annual symposium, Driving Efficiency, last month. The entire automotive industry is revving up to a future of what Andrea termed a “product and process technology revolution.”

As the auto segment goes, so goes the stamping industry, especially for those stamping manufacturers that supply automakers. Schuler hosting its event at the new Institute for Advanced Composites Manufacturing Innovation (IACMI) in Detroit is clear evidence of the auto segment's impact.

When one of the largest, most prominent, high-tech metal stamping press OEMs holds its annual conference at a lab devoted to plastic composites development for the automotive industry, it gives you pause.

Familiar Equipment, Unfamiliar Process

The conference was devoted to technology upgrades, with little differentiation between the metal and non-metal materials being formed. The commonality was the machinery doing the forming—familiar presses—and the application driving the innovation—automotive.

Considering that the automotive industry sources from a multitude of materials—various grades of steel, aluminum, and other metals, as well as many different types of plastics and carbon fiber-reinforced plastic—and that the materials are formed by a multitude of processes, including compression molding, as well as stamping, it probably should be no surprise that press manufacturers are exploring other avenues for their equipment, especially in this era of multiple new players in the auto industry.

At the event, Schuler showcased its 4,000-ton hydraulic compression molding press for the IACMI to use in its pursuit of better yields and less expensive manufacturing processes. The lab plans to use the compact, 20-ft.-tall press to improve and optimize carbon fiber-reinforced plastics to produce automotive parts.

If electronic commerce company Amazon can go into the grocery business, is it really such a stretch for a stamping manufacturer to produce plastic, compression-molded components on a hydraulic press?

Got thoughts? I’d love to hear from you. kateb@thefabricator.com.