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Prima Power uses Solid Edge OEM to increase productivity for their end-users

By David Chadwick

Prima Power is a global leader in providing machinery and systems for the manufacturing of sheet metal products. This includes machines for laser cutting, punching, shearing, and bending together with software for machine programming, production planning, and reporting. Prima Power has supplied more than 14,000 systems to 80 countries. These systems are used in diverse manufacturing industries including aerospace, automotive, electrical cabinets, energy, and HVAC.

A combined punching and shearing machine from Prima Power

Prima Power had previously incorporated Siemens Parasolid modeling kernel into their NC Express e3 CAM software. However, they wanted to give their end users access to more advanced CAD capabilities. This would enable them to quickly fix issues with the CAD models they receive.

Improving productivity for Prima Power’s end users

Jouni Hölsä, Prima Power’s team leader for CAM software development, expands on the issue they wanted to address for their end users. ”Sometimes a design model may not adapt to manufacturing on our sheet metal machinery. Material type, thickness, and other parameters can be adjusted in our existing CAM software. However, 3D CAD may be required to solve specific issues. For example, the thickness may not be constant, the flanges may be glued together, or the bend radius is inconsistent. If it is not possible for our end-users to edit a 3D model quickly and accurately, workflow interruptions can occur and their productivity can be adversely impacted.”

To solve this problem and increase productivity for their end-users, Prima Power has used Siemens Solid Edge OEM to develop NC Express e3 CAD. This solution allows a CAM operator to open a 3D model and modify it to align with CAM functions. Examples include modifications to support feature recognition, unfolding, and tooling selection.

Jouni states, “Solid Edge OEM enables us to equip our customers with NC Express e³ CAD, allowing an operator to separate a part model from the assembly and modify the part to fit to the sheet metal processing environment. One feature we particularly appreciate in Solid Edge OEM is that it gives our users the ability to open CAD files in many different CAD formats. This is particularly useful for our subcontracting customers.”

Prima Power’s NC Express e³ CAD software enables operators to modify Cad models prior to manufacturing

Building applications using Solid Edge OEM

Solid Edge OEM is a CAD foundation that enables third parties to build their own branded applications on top of a leading mechanical CAD software offering. It provides a comprehensive set of CAD design elements including 3D part modeling, sheet metal design, assembly design, and 2D engineering drawing creation. Third parties like Prima Power benefit from reducing their software development costs and time to market for their software applications. They can focus on their core strengths instead of reinventing CAD capabilities.

Solid Edge OEM provides a comprehensive set of CAD design elements
 for 3rd parties to build branded design applications

You can contact Prima Power to find out more about their sheet metal processing machinery and associated software offerings. Or you can register your interest in Solid Edge OEM and download our Solid Edge OEM data sheet. You can also view a 40 minute webinar replay to see more details of the partnership between Prima Power and Siemens.

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This article first appeared on the Siemens Digital Industries Software blog at https://blogs.sw.siemens.com/solidedge/prima-power-uses-solid-edge-oem-to-increase-productivity-for-their-end-users/