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Offer more to more customers
Rabourdin Industrie designs, manufactures and sells precision mechanical parts
for the moulded components, cutting and stamping sector. Its designs  (standard
moulds, guiding and centering parts, punches, hot runners…) are well known in
the plastic, smelting and sheet metal industries. Rabourdin Industrie also
supplies special threaded fasteners and other precision parts adapted to
particular markets such as the aeronautic, space and automobile industries.
The family business, founded in 1926, is located in Marne La Vallée. It has a
second production site in Picardie and employs about 270 people in France.
At the end of the 90’s, Rabourdin Industrie’s engineers wanted to have an
application that would automatically generate 2D models (in DXF and DWG formats)
using alphanumerical data organized in a database.
Olivier Musseau, the company’s technical documentation manager, told us the
reasons why: “The application had to allow us to suggest designs to our
customers. Working with a database would also permit data to be used for other
operations, for example for creating our hard copy catalogues.”
Therefore, the company started looking for software tools that were adapted to
our needs.
In 1999, TraceParts, still called Trace Software at the time, offered Parabase
that generated 2D static or parametric format models and exactly met our needs.
“We adopted the software and were able to design our own parameters for our
products,” continues Olivier Musseau. “However, over the years, we
noticed that our customers’ needs were changing and that they preferred 3D
models. Mould assemblies and evolving tools rapidly become very complex and a
three-dimensional digital model is usually necessary. We were faced with a new
problem for our designs: that of providing models for all of the different CAD
formats used in the industry.”
Going to a higher dimension
For Olivier Musseau, choosing a partner for this new step was not a problem:
“We were completely satisfied with TraceParts’ products and service for
generating 2D models and there was an excellent relationship between our two
companies. In addition, since we began working with TraceParts, they had
acquired a notoriety that increased visibility for our products. Not only were
we able to meet our customers’ needs, we were also able to gain new ones.”
Now our roles have changed somewhat: Rabourdin Industrie continues to program
geometric generation – this time in 3D – using TraceParts’ software tools. Then
we transfer our “digital models”, the dimensional and textual database (in
particular the tree-structured classification, product names and descriptions)
and the catalogue’s PDF pages that are linked to each product. TraceParts
ensures the availability of parts for all CAD formats on the market, putting
them online, and the selection logic for its own website as well as on the
company’s website.
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A smooth-running partnership
Olivier Musseau justifies these shared tasks:
“Although many of our parts are quite simple geometric
shapes, assemblies take into account many other
parameters such as guide dimensions according to the
thickness of moulds. We wanted to maintain the control
of initial model programming because it allows us to
validate technical parameters in-house. However, CAD is
not our profession and we could not ensure generation of
all 3D formats nor could we keep up with their
evolution.”
This way of working calls for a close partnership
because it is at a very high technical level. Since
Rabourdin Industrie is involved in the modeling process,
the company is attentive to respecting deadlines, rapid
reactivity and the pertinence of technical data that it
receives.
According to Olivier Musseau, “Technical exchanges
run very smoothly and in an atmosphere of partnership.”
CD-ROM and Internet
Rabourdin Industrie’s parts libraries are available at
the company’s website (www.rabourdin.fr)
and naturally at TraceParts’ website (www.tracepartsonline.net),
as well as through all distribution portals belonging to
TraceParts’ partners (SolidWorks 3DContentCentral,
Autodesk Manufacturing Community, Google SketchUp 3D
Warehouse, Pro/Engineer Catalog Portal, TopSolid, etc.).
The complete library is also available on CD-ROM. There
will soon be a complete update available for downloading
on the Rabourdin Industrie website. The manufacturer
thought that this would be helpful for engineering
departments who cannot provide online access to all of
its designers and drafters.
This is not the only “extra” service that the industry
offers to its customers: for three years now, the CD-ROM
includes an assistant for creating order forms. It
considerably speeds up exchange while guaranteeing data
reliability.
Special customer relations maintained
“Europe remains our main market. Today, nearly one-third of all downloads
from the TraceParts website is for models. 3D models
alone represent 85% of the demand. Our decision to go to
the 3D level and to do it with TraceParts was a wise
decision,” concludes Olivier Musseau.
Rabourdin Industrie’s special relationship with its
customers and product users does not stop at the limit
of the Internet. On the contrary, Internet opens the way
to new customers and allows the company to offer a high
quality extra service.
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