"A key to success in recruiting and keeping drivers for many North American long-haul truck fleets is to offer them world-class equipment," says Freightliner Corp President and CEO James L Hebe. Thus, truck cab styling--interiors in particular--is as competitive as automobile design. Prototyping and producing the wrap-around sleeper cabinetry for Freightliner's Century and Argosy Class Midroof truck lines is the job of the plastics division of Able Body Corp, Pittsburgh, KS. Able Body has a solid track record in rapid prototyping and precise thermoforming tooling.
A major consideration in thermoform prototyping is the necessity to make certain that the undercuts and the curves in the design don't lock the formed plastic to the high density foam tool. Once the data indicate the best position for tooling, the engineer creates a series of curves around the surfaces. Able Body engineers say Mastercam offers them a wide variety of surface types so that they can carry out the original designer's intent more closely, especially as necessary post-prototype production changes are made to the design. Mastercam's associativity cut that change time dramatically by automatically altering toolpaths as changes to the cabinet geometry are made.
As Freightliner's engineers make changes to the resulting prototype and its design, the toolpaths are automatically updated by Mastercam, saving much time in re-toolpathing after every change in the prototype-to-production chain. Once all the trim paths are created, they are tied together into one master toolpath file and released to production. There, the engineer uses Mastercam to make any trimming adjustments to suit customer changes and to help improve cycle time. |