Starrag
The pilot project showed that productivity in the measurement of turbine blades can be significantly increased with ZEISS PRISMO fortis
Starrag is known for developing manufacturing solutions for manufacturers within the aerospace industry. To help shorten the measurement times of turbine blades, the company agreed to participate in the ZEISS PRISMO fortis CMM pilot project.
“Speed and maximum precision didn’t go together for a long time,” said Roland Ziltener, Plant Director at Starrag AG, Rorschacherberg. “Quality assurance, therefore, quickly becomes a bottleneck. To ensure reliable and profitable production, you need speedy and reliable feedback as to whether the components meet the high-quality requirements.”
Prioritising customer requirements
Customers travel to Rorschacherberg with specific tasks to obtain suitable machining centres to produce turbine blades, blisks, impellers, casings and other aircraft applications. Starrag designs production solutions, incorporating the appropriate fixtures based on specific requirements relating to the number of units or running time of the components.
Ziltener, added, “Starrag is not only familiar with the requirements of the industry but is also at the cutting edge of technology in many areas, including measurement technology.”
Reflecting on the ZEISS PRISMO fortis CMM pilot project
Ivan Nytsch, Head of Global Customer Segment Aerospace at ZEISS, “Starrag is an ideal pilot customer.” Among other reasons, the fact that the company is familiar with its customers’ manufacturing processes adds to this belief, something that ZEISS also prioritises. ZEISS responded to the aerospace industry’s need to measure aerospace components quickly, reliably, and with high precision through the expansion of the PRISMO family with the ZEISS PRISMO 7/12/7 fortis CMM.
Ziltener, who remembers the pilot project well, added, “We had a look at the machine in Oberkochen and were immediately impressed.” Ensuring all turbine blades meet precision requirements even with these quicker measuring times, Starrag decided to measure parts using the ZEISS PRISMO fortis over 18 months. With varying materials, sizes, and geometries of turbine blades, the machine was put through its paces. To evaluate the accuracy levels of the ZEISS PRISMO fortis, results were compared to reference values from the ZEISS PRISMO navigator. Both CMMs were located in the same measuring laboratory, ruling out potential influencing external factors.
Throughout the pilot project, Starrag and ZEISS worked together, sharing information like measurement data in regular meetings. ZEISS utilised this information to help optimise the start-up and acceleration behaviour of the rotary table and the machine, improvements to usability were also made.
Changes post-pilot project
Following the end of the pilot, Starrag acquired the measuring machine to measure turbine blades. These blades acted as proof of the concept. Ziltener believes that Starrag has set new standards in quality assurance as a result of the pilot project, which is particularly important as the industry requires the highest precision in production and quality control. He went on to say that the collaboration with ZEISS was and is “a real success story”.
