As the U.S. aerospace industry took an economic downturn a few years back, Arden Engineering was forced to reengineer itself to remain a strong and competitive company. Arden struggled to keep costs down while providing its customers with the best value possible. Over time, part production became increasingly cumbersome, taking three times as long as their competitors. With productivity down, higher production costs, and increasing end user costs, it became evident that investing in new technology was necessary to stay ahead of its competition. Therefore, Arden Engineering invested in the best, high-end technology available that would increase customer satisfaction through excellence in quality, competitive rates, and on-time delivery.

Established in 1979 with 10 employees, Arden Engineering Incorporated has grown to 110+ diverse employees occupying 66,310 square feet in its own manufacturing plant on 2.45 acres of land in Orange County, CA. Arden serves the aerospace industry, specializing in on-site engineering, programming, three-, four-, and five-axis CNC machining and assembly of structural aerospace components. The type of parts manufactured include a diversification in commercial, military, regional jet aircraft, helicopter and space vehicles, in support of 21 customers in 30 locations throughout the world.

Mike Stow, President, Arden Engineering states, "Our customers evaluate us by our commitments, and our opportunities will be determined by our ability to meet these commitments. Our goal is to provide our customers with the best value possible, in a collaborative environment, and at the same time reduce costs".

Accepting The Challenge

"We accept this challenge knowing full well that it would push us all. This task would require us to plan, program, tool and manufacture, along with inspection and processing time within a compressed lead-time. It's not going to be easy, but can be done", says management.

Inrease in Efficient Programming

With the NCL programming system added to the company's repertoire, Arden Engineering gained a reputation for complete customer satisfaction. The company selected NCL multi-axis machining software from NCCS primarily for its advanced functionality and tool control. Immediately, NCL cut production time in half while lowering customer costs. With a library of aerospace application macros already preloaded, easily accessible with a click of the mouse, the company was able to save up to 50% of its programming time generating tool paths.

Arden benefited from NCL's five-axis roughing capability automatically calculating a contour or rectangular stock model, enabling Arden to quickly rough large imported models. The system calculated the extent of the area to machine, minimizing programming time and reducing inefficiencies.

NCL Improves Productivity

Arden also uses PostWorks universal postprocessor from NCCS. PostWorks is a universal two- through 10-axis postprocessor and postprocessor generator. It converts output from most major CAM systems into NC data files, which can be used to run virtually any NC device including mills, lathes, mill/turns, CMMs, lasers, ultrasonic cutters, and routers. The simple interface enabled Arden to easily establish machine configurations, control unit features, and output file formats. The comprehensive macro language of PostWorks made customization more time and cost effective.

Center of Excellence

Arden is now spoken of as a low maintenance supplier, with parts delivered on time and to the customer's specifications. "This is a major cost savings value we provide to our customers. Time is money and the addition of NCL has enabled us to reduce the time required in managing the supplier, while providing confidence in quality and on-time delivery", states John Fairris, Sales & Marketing.

Arden Engineering realized its potential after implementing the latest CNC technology and NCL CAM software, along with employment training. This investment increased the company's ability to be responsive to its customer's needs, improving consultive engineering, repeatability, and quality, giving the company its competitive edge.

"At Arden Engineering, we are committed to creating solutions for our customers. NCL gives us the ability to design fixtures and program CNC machines around the customer's specific design needs. The utilization of NCL paired with our high-tech equipment allowed us to increase part production and reduce the cost of manufacturing by 50%, which is passed on to our valued customers", comments Paul Roe, programming & engineering manager.

To be successful in the aerospace industry requires much commitment and dedication. Without this, the ability to compete will be hampered and opportunities will be hard to come by. Arden has indeed met the challenge and delivered. With the addition of NCL, Arden Engineering now has the skill to respond quickly to customer demands by reducing programming, tooling, and production times.