A stamping company that produces work for both the appliance and the automotive industry was spending over $120,000 on lube annually. Sprayed fluid was dripping off the presses and the costliest issue was that their parts were being rejected regularly by their customer for excess fluid.
Their operators were mixing fluids by hand and shutting down their presses to go get fluid to fill their spray containers. This meant their ratios of concentrate to water were not always accurate and they had substantial press downtime.
Our first recommendation was to introduce roller systems in place of their wasteful spray systems. Right away the rejection rate from their customer was reduced to zero, their press area was cleaned up, and they reduced fluid use by 40%. We also introduced an automated central mixing system that was plumbed to each press which made their mixtures consistent, the press downtime for transporting fluid was eliminated, and they saved another 10-15% in fluid waste.
Lastly, the customer was using two separate fluids at a relatively high concentration rate of 7 to 1. We recommended one fluid and concentrations of 10 and 12 to 1 depending on the application. With the implementation of a more capable fluid that could be diluted further, this supplier was able to save an additional 25% in fluid usage just by the mix ratio itself.
Overall, this customer was able to save 60% of their fluid usage making the investment pay for itself in one year.