Metalformer Laser - Cuts in 2d, Manages Growth in 3D

When the firm installed its first lasercutting machine in January 2005, American Cap owner-managers Todd Diehl (COO) and second-generation family owners Phil Moroco II (president) and Rich Moroco (CEO) envisioned a machine useful for producing laser blanks. The firm, 80-employees strong, deep-draws the blanks into cylinder caps and other related products. Much of its deep-draw metalforming is relatively low volume, not justifying investment in a blanking die.

"We had been sending out a fair amount of laser cutting to regional processors," recalls Phil Moroco, "and we felt that we could better control edge quality as well as lead time if we brought that capability inhouse.Any edge roughness can hamper our ability to deep draw, and some suppliers priced us out of the business because our volumes were too low."

While the firm used to develop its blanks using a circle shear, early on it found that the ability to cut a variety of blank designs on a laser-cutting machine was extremely valuable. "For example, we just finalized a new design for one of our valve guards where a custom laser-cut deep-draw blank allows us to consolidate parts and eliminate an arc-welding process," shares Diehl. The process required a forward extrusion with a large cavity in the extrusion. Efficient blank development was critical to getting the job into production quickly, and to optimizing material utilization.