Creo Customers: Innovative PCs and Laptops Come to Life

By GEOFF HEDGES | Published: JUL 19, 2011

When PTC holds its customer events, I’m always intrigued by the number of participants and the diversity of roles and jobs they fill. Maybe you are too. That’s why I love these man-on-the-street  or, rather, engineer-at-the-trade-show vignettes. Let’s face it, you and I can’t easily interrupt busy strangers in conference hallways and ask them what they do and how–but our camera crews can!

In this video, we hear from a 15-year veteran of Creo Parametric. He works for a Fortune Global 500 company, headquartered in China, that designs and manufactures PCs and laptops. His company is one of the world’s largest makers of personal computers and makes the world’s most innovative PCs. Find out how he uses Creo unlock value in his highly competitive, fast-paced industry.

Creo Customers: Military Helicopters Stay Airborne with Creo

By GEOFF HEDGES | Published: JUN 17, 2011

In the action movies, military helicopters are the stars of all the airborne excitement. We see them swerve around tall buildings in chases, swoop in to deliver or rescue troops in inhospitable terrain, and, sometimes, even take a dramatic hit from ground fire. What we never see, however, are the guys who come along later, laptops at their side, to fix the battered machines—guys like Troy Moser.  

In real life, military helicopters ferry troops, project power, drop off supplies, carry out medical evacuations, and serve numerous other purposes. And, in real life, they can take on some damage. When that happens, teams come in to repair and modify the helicopters in the field—since it’s impractical to send aircraft back to the manufacturer.

Troy Moser is a project engineer on one such action field team. For him, fixing military helicopters means working with the original design data, documenting and driving ECOs, and capturing revised design data in field. That’s where the laptop—and Creo—come in.

While you’re not likely to see the field repair team in the final scenes of your favourite summer blockbuster, their work is in many ways far more fascinating—especially if you’re interested in manufacturing and engineering. Find out more about Moser, his role, and how Creo running on his laptop is helping him repair and upgrade aircraft in Afghanistan and Iraq.

 Image courtesy of U.S. Air Force, Lance Cheung

Creo Customer: Epson Technologies a Keeper

By Geoff Hedges | Published: August 12, 2011

 

Manufacturing moves fast, especially when it comes to printers. Models land on store shelves, and they’re obsolete less than a year later. That’s because consumers and the competition demand ever more features and conveniences in their electronics–so says Allison and Vince in this episode of The Product Design Show.

Yet, as the industry adds models and options, not everything changes. Not for Epson, the manufacturer featured in this episode. While Epson is one of the most successful printing manufacturers in the world, capable of designing new models in 12 weeks, the company also knows when to stick with what works.

In 1990, it developed a unique technology for inkjets, using mechanical pressure to fire ink onto the page. Other print manufacturers use thermal systems that vaporize the ink. Epson says its Micro Piezo system is more precise, looks sharper and smoother, and operates at a lower temperature. The company believes it’s still the best technology for inkjet printers today, 20 years later.

In 2000, the company made another lasting decision: it introduced 3D direct modeling . Managers at Epson say Creo’s direct modeling approach was easy for its 2D users to learn and adopt, and they’ve been working in 3D ever since. In fact, in 2006 they stopped designing new printers with 2D all together. Direct modeling technology has remained a “keeper” for the company because it continues to unlock value as engineers re-use and adapt existing models to meet the latest market demands.

Creo Customer: Exmark Cuts Down Product Line Redundancies

By Geoff Hedges | Published: August 11, 2011

It’s August. We’re in the thick of the grass-growing season, and I’ve just realized my lawn mower is lame. First of all, I have to manually pull a cord to start the engine. It’s forever dripping oil. And there’s no place to sit.

Now, check out the mowers from Creo customer Lazer Z. I’m especially interested in the Pioneer with its pneumatic caster wheels, coil spring suspension, and low center of gravity for superior traction. It cuts almost 30 acres in an hour, and it’s got arm rests!
But we’re here to talk about design software.

The Lazer Z Pioneer is manufactured by Exmark, and it’s one of almost 40 models the company produces, including a recent line of energy efficient mowers. The company designs it equipment using Creo Parametric.

Until recently, Exmark produced each of its product families separately.  “Our product lines had been developed over more than a decade and included similar parts that had been redesigned from scratch to accomplish the same task,” says Steve Finkner, Senior Engineering Manager at Exmark.

All that has changed. The company redesigned the entire product line, basing all of its mowers on a single assembly model. That’s where Creo Parametric comes in. Exmark now builds its models off a single parametric model. All the parts and assemblies common to other models are “overloaded” into the basic assembly. Everything else is simplified. Now when a common part changes, it’s reflected quickly in all the new models.

That one process improvement has unlocked value for the Exmark team, more than tripling the number of parts common to all its designs. It’s cut design time in half, which in turn has led to more models on the market faster. Watch for Exmark Manufacturing and its Lazer Z turf equipment in this episode of The Product Design Show.