Mechanical Technology April 2015

Mechanical Technology — April 2015

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Power transmission, bearings, bushes and seals

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Above:

A Bonfiglioli 300-series planetary

drive under test at Bonfiglioli’s ISO 9001:

2008 accredited Linbro Park assembly

facility.

Left:

An overland conveyor drive for

the Kendal Power Station based on the

Bonfiglioli HDO 130 bevel-helical gear

reducer. Five of these were locally assembled

in Bonfiglioli’s ISO 9001-accredited facility

in Linbro Park.

Right:

An HD-series gearbox housing being

loaded onto Bonfiglioli’s precision press

for assembly. According to Beukman, ISO

accreditation offers “peace of mind to our

Italian parents and to our local customers,

who benefit from better reliability, longer life

cycles and ultimately lower costs”.

The positive result of this is that all

local assembly facilities and manufactur-

ers of sub-components are operating to

globally benchmarked quality standards.

“We are also under pressure to im-

prove the quality standards of our local

suppliers. Part of the analysis that we

are required to feed back to Italy is the

product specifications and quality ac-

creditations of our local supply chain.

We are sent recommendations from Italy

on the component and material quality

required, and we send samples to Italy

for testing, approvals and ongoing quality

monitoring,” he continues. While some

variations might be tolerated, every com-

ponent used in any system needs to be

inline with global quality requirements.

“Bearings, for example, all have des-

ignated specifications, which we send to

all local suppliers. But everything from

the paint used on a housing to the steel

for a base plate has to conform to qual-

ity standards. And this applies to all of

our engineering sub-contractor too. On

engineered components, for example,

such as customised flanges, couplings,

customised shafts, base plates and other

assembly components, while these often

need to be manufactured locally, we can

only use ISO 9001-approved companies,

which must also meet all the Bonfiglioli-

specified quality requirements such as

those for material specifications and

machining tolerances,” Beukman relates,

adding that quality has a flow-through ef-

fect that pushes everyone involved in the

supply chain to “up their game”.

Localisation is key to reducing lead

times and meeting tight supply sched-

ules. “And our Bonfiglioli parent has no

qualms about supporting localisation.

But our gearboxes are often critical plant

components, so quality is paramount.

Should we fail to meet the global stan-

dards for any product, then we could

be forced to import. Because we now

have local accreditation, though, along

with full internal quality management

support, Bonfiglioli Italy are comfortable

enough to allow us to assemble the full

product range, including complex drives

and drive train systems, even those that

we have not assembled locally before.

This significantly reduces lead times for

local clients.

“ISO accreditation offers peace of

mind to our Italian parents and to our

local customers, who benefit from better

reliability, longer life cycles and ultimately

lower costs. In Africa, downtime is a seri-

ous issue. Anywhere in Europe or here in

Gauteng, a gearbox can be brought into

a workshop for a quick inspection and

repair. But this can’t be done so easily

from remote places in Africa. Quality

and the associated reliability therefore

become key issues, and these need to be

managed, from the design at the outset

all the way through to onsite commission-

ing,” Beukman concludes.