Herbold Meckesheim uses Solidworks® to create and visualize 3D layouts of large machine lines. The task is particularly challenging due to the extremely complex, detailed assemblies that make up Herbold’s systems. With Lino® Simplify, the company found the right, simplifying solution.
In order to be able to process plastic waste into valuable raw materials on an industrial scale, Herbold Meckesheim GmbH develops high-performance machines that transform the raw material into unmixed plastic flakes. The long-established company designs and manufactures systems up to 200 meters long for this purpose. These consist of shredders, granulators, hot-washing stages, dryers, agglomerators and other machines that Herbold designs using the 3D CAD system Solidworks.
The CAD software is the central tool. Herbold not only uses it to create individual assemblies and machines, but also all layouts for complete lines and plants. These layouts, in turn, are used throughout the entire process, from sales to project implementation at the customer’s premises. Because even the smallest elements that were previously defined in the design phase are incorporated into the layouts, they are extremely detailed. This also increases the amount of data in the system layout.
Processing and visualizing this data pushes even powerful IT hardware to its limits: even opening larger layouts or making the smallest changes to them used to cause barely tolerable waiting times. Herbold was also looking for simple ways to hide individual assemblies in Solidworks. After all, innovations and intellectual property should also be protected when layouts are given to third parties.
The special machine manufacturer found an immediately obvious solution in Lino GmbH and its Solidworks add-on Lino Simplify. This is because the Lino software specializes in precisely this: Drastically reducing the data volumes of assemblies and selectively hiding critical details. For Herbold, the seamless integration into Solidworks was also a door opener. The employees quickly found their way around the familiar software environment and produced impressively simplified 3D layouts in a very short time.
Herbold Meckesheim is gradually replacing old layouts from non-simplified models with new, simplified versions. The company benefits from individual adaptations of the Lino solution, which fits seamlessly into Herbold’s processes. This flexibility is also in the DNA of Lino Simplify: Herbold can freely set which elements are to be simplified and to what extent in the layouts. Technological innovations are therefore protected even if otherwise detailed 3D representations are used.
Above all, however, the streamlined visualizations can be easily sent as Parasolid or STEP files and opened on laptops or tablets. In this way, they help to clarify details with customers or make it easier for installers and assembly workers to work on site. Almost incidentally, Herbold Meckesheim is significantly speeding up its own processes and advancing more and more projects in less and less time.
Find out more about the Herbold project in the detailed case study.