Made in the Midlands member Greene Tweed & Co, has been on a challenging yet rewarding journey to automating their workshop over the last couple of years. So far, the investment includes the utilisation of Cobots with CNC machinery and MIR component transporters. Tony Baldassarra, Sealing Systems EVSM and UK Site Lead at GT, believes it’s helping the company close the skills gap, become a more attractive employer and achieve maximum efficiency.
Greene Tweed & Co, is a global manufacturer of high performance thermoplastics, composites, and engineered components. Established over 150 years ago, their product offering includes custom-engineered sealing solutions for a variety of sectors. With plants in the USA, UK/Europe and Taiwan, the company has remained dedicated to new ideas and high performance and safety critical products. In order to achieve this, GT has continued to invest in the latest technology, to optimise efficiency and stay inline with the ongoing changes in the industry, especially at its plant in Nottingham, UK.
Tony Baldassarra is considered an leader in optimising efficiency in business, employee engagement & development while investing in the right places to improve productivity - especially in the eyes of staff at Greene Tweed, Nottingham. The company’s highest external investment took place early this year. The £2.8M Mouldshop which Edward Johnson-Kolb, Value Stream Manager has headed up from cradle (to grave), has been very active in working with Tony and the automation team aligning the technology projects to the business strategy. The Mouldshop is set to take the company to new heights of productivity with the opportunity to produce more plastic components for customers faster and more energy efficient than ever before. However, what is most impressive is the company’s adoption and engagement with automation to deal with the skills shortage and the higher demand.
GT has invested in their staff, upskilling them in the world of automation to ensure the technology works around them. This has resulted in the use of multiple Cobot arms in conjunction with CNC machinery. Machine operators now work across three machines, rather than one. The Cobot arm loads material and extracts the products from the machine, the human is solely responsible for operating and setting the CNC machinery.
Efficiency is also optimised when it comes to navigating products and materials around the facility. MIR’s are responsible for carrying job-packs to work centres from the Preparation section then collecting the finished product and transporting them to designated areas, as well as manoeuvring other materials in the same way.
To get automation to work for them, GT has trained long established staff such as James Brown, Automation Technician, and Steven Buckley, Senior Production Technician to work with the complex technology, while adding to the team with Dave Fox, Senior Technical Associate. This has resulted in a testing area where automation equipment is goes through a trial programme before introduced to the workstation. Whilst the implementation of automation began in 2020, the company only started utilising it in June 2022.
Steven said: “The pay back from learning about this technology and implementing into our everyday processes has seen endless benefit. There seems to be a preconception that automation, particularly robots and Cobots, are taking people's jobs. That’s not the case here, we have to interact with it and it is therefore teaching us the skills of the future whilst improving overall productivity.”
As with many manufacturing and engineering businesses, GT Nottingham has faced recruitment challenges over the last couple of years. However, their approach to engaging staff with new technologies is also making them a more attractive employer. James Brown is responsible for project management, design and troubleshooting - working particularly with Cobots, Knife skive, MIR’s and Touchscreen project visibility.
James said: “Learning new skills in the role has given me a bigger and better understanding of integration of complex systems. There is a realisation that there is no such thing as plug and play, but also it is worth using this technology to help employees become more efficient.”
James believes that the Nottingham plant has had this positive reaction to the adoption of automation because of their encouraging top down leadership. James mentioned that many employees questioned the integration of Cobots at first. He continued:
“We have a positive culture at Greene Tweed which I believe has been a major factor in the company embracing automation.”
Though the two-year implementation has been challenging, it has set GT on a leading path for the future. The inclusion of this technology will help the business attract a new generation of machinists and operators who are tech savvy and engaged with high performance technology.
Tony, Sealing Systems EVSM and UK Site Lead at GT, concluded: “Automation is navigating the company towards improving efficiency, driving down costs and tackling recruitment challenges. We sat down with our team to plan out the new factory floor, ensuring we listen to the employees who work there every day. Greene Tweed has supported the investment through Capex with the aim to standardize the manufacturing operations globally at all our sites. Our achievements have come from strategic planning, visibility, looking at the skills gap and focusing on what is needed to change. All this without the comprise of Safety or Quality.
To be successful in the future we need a new generation of people to take up roles in manufacturing. To inspire them to do this, we need to be able to offer them these tech savvy roles.”
Find out more about Greene Tweed: https://greenetweed.madeinthemidlands.com/