Tooling plays a vital role in parts manufacturing, its precision and characteristics determining the quality and accuracy of the finished part, whether produced in low or in high volume production runs. Tooling comes in a variety of forms: it may be a jig or fixture for work holding, welding or inspection; a cutting tool for milling, turning or grinding, or a special die for cold forming, forging or extrusion.

As vital as these tools are to the manufacturing process, tooling in all its forms has generally been perceived to be a disproportionately high cost element of a product development and manufacturing project, and customers are often confused about the way tooling suppliers charge for their services, since there is no standard definition to guide cost calculations for what is, after all, a complex and demanding process.

While this may have been the case in the past, new methods of developing tooling using modern engineering software has not only significantly reduced the time it takes to complete the tooling process, but it has also cut the associated costs, all without compromising the quality and accuracy of the manufactured parts or the repeatability of finish and tolerances that can be achieved – even over a lengthy production run.

Software solutions

Engineering high quality tooling, especially for the latest high speed, multi-spindle CNC machines and cold forming systems is a highly skilled, professionally led business. And while a successful outcome will always depend on the skills and experience of the tool and die maker, the process of tooling development has been dramatically enhanced in recent years with the introduction of powerful computer aided design, modelling and simulation software.

Cost overruns and time delays often occurred in the past because the development of tooling was essentially an iterative process, with design improvements made through a succession of prototype stages. Although this iterative methodology continues today, the use of advanced engineering tools, such as the SolidWorks computer aided design and engineering platform and Scientific Forming Technologies’ DEFORM metal forming and process simulation software, has enabled the process of tool design, analysis and testing to be carried out on-screen, rather than in the tool-room. This effectively eliminates the traditional trial and error approach commonly associated with tool making and allows correctly dimensioned and quality approved tooling to be manufactured ‘right first time’.

With the lack of standard definitions to guide tooling cost calculations, suppliers have had to adopt a variety of practices to calculate and charge-out the cost of developing tooling. The most professional among these suppliers have tried to be more consistent in the way they price, charge-out and present tooling costs to their customers, and software has again come to the rescue in this area. Using software such as SolidWorks and DEFORM allows engineers to accurately assess the time, labour and materials required to produce individual tool sets, an approach that is gradually seeing a level of standardisation emerge across the sector.

Dawson Shanahan's approach, for example, is to use the power of these software tools, working with each customer to explain how tooling costs are calculated and then finding the solution that works best for both parties. Typically, this might either be a one-off charge or an agreement to amortise the cost of tooling across the lifetime of the project.

Whichever route is chosen, a critical step in the process will always be to consider how the cost of both tooling and the overall project can best be reduced, while ensuring all other criteria, such as part quality and delivery deadlines, remain unaffected. Such an approach has the potential to enhance customer service and reputation for those companies selling upwards through the supply chain.