CNC routing of vehicle body components for Wielton: from client-supplied boards back to the line

01 Context and challenge

Most people associate Wielton with trailers. This time it was about something smaller: bodies for small goods vehicles, including food delivery vehicles, in a project linked to the UK market. Each such body needs a floor and side walls, and these have to be cut and machined from boards before they go to assembly.

The client had the material. What it needed was a machining partner that would fit into its production rhythm. The challenge had three elements:

• time: the components were needed at short notice, because an assembly line was waiting for them;
• accuracy: the floor and side walls have to fit the body structure, so every component in a batch must be identical to the previous one;
• return logistics: the machined semi-finished parts do not go to an end customer but back to the factory, to a specific stage of production.

02 Our role and solution

What we did

We received boards supplied by Wielton and machined them on our CNC router into floor and side wall components for the vehicle bodies. Based on data from the client, we prepared production, routed the batches, assembled the finished components and handed them over so that they could go onto the line without repacking. This is typical CNC routing work with client-supplied material: we are responsible for machining and workmanship, the client for the choice of material and the body design.

What we did not do

We did not supply the boards, design the bodies or fit them to the vehicles. Nor were we responsible for the vehicle structure or type approval. Our task was the stage in between: turning the client's board into a finished component that goes back onto its line.

03 How we worked

Working with client-supplied material starts with receiving the boards and checking that the delivery matches what we have to cut from it. We then nest the components on the sheets and prepare the machining programs. With a series of body components, repeatability is what matters most: we check the first component in a batch against the drawing, and the rest have to replicate it exactly.

We assembled the finished components according to the needs of the line, so that the client did not have to sort or adjust them. The same logic guides us in panel cutting and bending on other projects. Here, however, the recipient was not a shop or an event organiser but a production hall working to its own schedule.

Geography turned out to be a logistical advantage. Wielton is also based in Wieluń, so the route between our CNC router and the client's assembly hall was short. Semi-finished parts could go back to the factory in batches, in step with production, without warehousing and without long transport. We chose the packing and delivery method according to the order in which the components were needed on the line.

04 Results

The main result is operational: floor and side wall components made from the client's material went back onto Wielton's production line as finished semi-finished parts. The client did not have to expand its own board machining for this project, and the bodies for the UK market could be built from components made at a neighbouring plant.

For us, this project showed that an advertising company's machine park can genuinely support industrial production, not just supply its signage.

05 What set us apart

Since 1991 we have worked to deadlines: campaigns, events, retail chains. This habit transfers well to industrial subcontracting, where instead of an event date there is the date the components go onto the line. Then there is proximity. Sharing Wieluń meant that the return logistics for semi-finished parts, which with a distant subcontractor is often the hardest part, became an advantage here.

The cooperation with Wielton has other facets too. We describe separately the printing and signage for its plants and 3D prototypes of covers and lamp components.