Plexus Systems (News - Alert), providers of Plexus Online on-demand software for the manufacturing enterprise, announced the Advanced Technology Institute of North Charleston, South Carolina is using Plexus Online to facilitate collaboration, coordination and information-sharing among its partners — governmental, industrial and academic.

 

Plexus Online is the official Tool Uploading System for forging companies, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and government agencies that participate in the National Forging Tooling Database.

 

The NFTD is a Web-based tool that was developed in association with the Defense Logistics Agency, which handles purchasing for the U.S. Department of Defense, and the Forging Defense Manufacturing Consortium. The University of Toledo led the development of the NFTD, which was developed under a cost shared, Manufacturing Technology Program known as PRO-FAST (News - Alert).

 

As weapons systems in the U.S. arsenal go out of production, the acquisition of forged repair parts becomes more difficult because supply chain information disintegrates over time, especially in respect to tooling. In addition, some weapons systems are being kept in service much longer than originally intended.

 

As this happens, forged parts that were designed to last the life of the weapon have to be replaced and the location of tools to make the forged parts becomes lost. Bet you didn't know that. I sure didn't.

 

In April Plexus Systems announced it signed contracts with Wescast Industries, a supplier of cast exhaust manifolds for passenger cars and light trucks. Under the agreements Plexus will provide a global implementation of Plexus Online.

 

Plexus Online is expected to bring "continuity, flexibility and adaptability to Wescast's global operations," according to Plexus officials, who say the supplier wants "consistent and integrated business information throughout its organization, including manufacturing processes, engineering, sales" and other business processes.

 

Implementation will begin with the Wescast Asian Business Unit centered in Wuhan, China and one North American facility.

 

The DOD commissioned the creation of the NFTD to let forging supply chains locate forgers with tooling for legacy aircraft, vehicles and weaponry. The NFTD was developed to give defense customers, especially the Defense Logistics Agency, a centralized database of the tooling available.

 

The data uploaded into the database are warehoused in another tool called Haystack Gold which is provided by IHS (News - Alert) of Denver. Haystack Gold links tooling to a repository of procurement data related to these critical parts. The cost to duplicate this tooling is estimated at approximately -- get this -- $5 billion. Even if only one percent of the tooling in the NFTD is used to make forger parts, the savings would be about 50 times DOD's project cost.

 

In most cases, the more important benefit is that replacement parts can be made quickly so weapon availability is increased and warfighter safety is enhanced. In one case, early in the development of the NFTD, DOD had been searching for a qualified supplier for an aircraft part for two years. After one contractor failed to deliver the part because the forged part could not be located, the NFTD was invoked. Within a few minutes the tooling was located and the finished part was delivered in thirty days.