Grinding gets smart

Through a partnership with an industrial internet of things specialist, Coborn Engineering Co. Ltd., Romford, U.K., adapted machines for grinding and polishing diamonds into smart equipment by implementing digital services. According to Steve Westlake, managing director of Coborn, the technology from Berlin-based relayr GmbH enables a unique predictive maintenance regime. (Precision International Corp., Haines City, Florida, is the sole authorized agent for Coborn in North America, and relayr’s worldwide corporate headquarters are in Boston.)

“We were planning to develop a ‘smart’ machine but knew that we would have to work with an IoT partner,” Westlake noted in an email. “We then received an email from relayr, which explained their vision and technology. This aligned perfectly with our requirements, so we started the dialogue.”

A cutting tool is ground on a Coborn RG9A grinding machine. Image courtesy of Coborn Engineering

The partnership will help Coborn grinders be more predictive of any failures or breakdowns and other machine optimization recommendations, noted Guneet Bedi, general manager of the Americas for relayr. “As a result, Coborn can reduce downtime and increase revenue streams.”

With anomaly detection through relayr’s artificial intelligence-based analytics, data collected from Coborn’s machines will allow the machine builder to determine and resolve failures in advance. AI-based analytics establishes a normal operation signature for a machine in operation, Westlake explained.

“The machines are being monitored and analyzed constantly, so when the normal signature changes, we are notified of (the) anomaly so that we can investigate this possible problem from the U.K.,” he stated. “If we detect a developing problem, we can contact our customer and plan a machine shutdown to address the problem or plan a visit from one of our service engineers.”

Delivering preemptive service to each customer will enable Coborn to offer machines with guaranteed performance and availability targets, according to the company. The predictive element will allow Coborn to manage most failures, but there will still be random failures, which the company must address, Westlake added.

“We will guarantee that a machine will not be unavailable for a specified period of time depending on which global market the machine is operating in,” he stated. “If we are unable to repair the machine within this time, we will pay the customer an agreed daily rate for lost production.”