Digital Services
Increased uptime and improved quality with Bühler Insights
Die-casting foundries are under increasing pressure to deliver more high-quality parts with fewer production interruptions. Customers expect consistent quality, reliable delivery, shorter lead times, and competitive part prices. At the same time, many foundries face a shortage of experienced process specialists. This combination makes process stability one of the most important factors for competitiveness. The digital services platform Bühler Insights is designed to support foundries in increasing the uptime of their die-casting cells while improving part quality.
Die-casting companies operate in a market characterized by high technical standards, strong demand for lightweight structural components, and growing expectations regarding sustainability and resource efficiency. However, cost pressure is also rising. Energy, labor, maintenance, and raw material costs directly impact part costs. In this environment, every rejected casting, every unplanned stop, and every inefficient restart negatively impact profitability.
Bühler’s die-casting vision is to help foundries move closer to the ideal die-casting cell and achieve measurable improvements in daily production. Three targets define this approach: cycle time reduction, availability maximization, and scrap elimination. These targets are closely connected. A shorter cycle time only creates value if the process remains stable. High availability only improves output if good-part production is maintained. Scrap elimination requires both machine capability and a clear understanding of process behavior. Therefore, digitalization has become a central element of Bühler’s die-casting strategy.
Digitalization in die-casting foundries
Digitalization is not intended to replace process knowledge, but to make process knowledge easier to apply. In complex die-casting cells, many events can influence the final casting quality, including shot profile deviations, die-temperature variations, extraction issues, alarms, die-program changes, operator interventions, and restart conditions. Without structured data, it is difficult to connect these influences to defects.
Bühler Insights creates value by making machine and cell behavior transparent. It enables production, maintenance, and technology teams to move from reactive troubleshooting to systematic process improvement. This reduces the workload on skilled specialists and helps new team members build the required process knowledge faster.
From machine capability to process transparency
Defects in die casting rarely appear without warning. Porosity, filling issues, surface defects, dimensional deviations, cold shuts, cracks, or incomplete filling are often the visible results of earlier process instability. The root cause may originate several cycles before the defect is detected. Typical indicators include drifting process parameters, repeated alarms, and die-program changes. Production stops and trial corrections result in the loss of valuable production time. In many cases, the question is not whether the data exists. The challenge lies in whether the data is accessible, understandable, and connected to the production result. This is where Bühler’s Digital Services become important.
Three levels of Bühler’s Digital Services
Bühler’s Digital Services start on the machine level. The die-casting equipment forms the foundation of the die-casting cell. It enables precise die-program configuration and ensures that the die-casting machine operates with optimized process settings.
The cell automation system coordinates part flow across the entire production cell and records each part’s history for complete traceability. A single, centralized HMI allows operators to monitor and control the complete cell efficiently and intuitively.
The machine and cell data is collected, analyzed, and visualized on Bühler Insights, making it available for production meetings, shift handovers, maintenance planning, troubleshooting, and technology analysis.
Increasing uptime through structured downtime analysis
High uptime is essential for competitive die-casting production. Even short interruptions can significantly impact output. In addition, every stop and restart can influence thermal balance, lubrication behavior, die conditions, and process stability. Traditional downtime analysis often focuses on what happened after production stopped. The cause is often added manually and cannot be verified. A digital approach makes it possible to understand what happened before, during, and after the interruption in order to reduce downtime sustainably.
Bühler Insights tracks production interruptions automatically and identifies the issues with the greatest impact on availability. Based on the data, actions can be defined and their impact monitored in real time.
Improving quality through process monitoring
Scrap is not just a quality issue. It is also a matter of process transparency and response time. In many foundries, defects are detected at the end of the process, even though the cause occurred earlier in the cycle. Digital monitoring reduces this delay by indicating when process values move away from the defined target range. Personalized notifications alert specialists when process values deviate from defined target ranges, while customized widgets help teams assess the impact on good-part production.
By turning production data into actionable information, Bühler Insights helps foundries increase uptime and produce more good parts with existing equipment. The goal is to provide the right information to the right people at the right time. Because of its extensive expertise in die-casting, Bühler is always available to provide its customers with customized support.
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