ATI FirePro GraphicsWorkstation Graphics Accelerators

Besides the range of standard and custom-built trenchers and plows, Mastenbroek supplies cable and pipe laying systems, trench backfill machines, tracked gravel trucks, tractor pulled gravel trailers and a range of custom built special machinery. Mastenbroek is a family owned British company that prides itself on innovative design, engineering excellence and an unsurpassed after sales service. According to Mark Taylor, Currently, its all about drainage. Our machines are helping bring previously unviable farmland into production in India, Croatia, Holland and other nearby European countries. He adds, Our machines are designed for specific jobs and to do those jobs a better, more environmentally friendly way. In reality, we are selling the ability to drain this field, put that pipe in, dig this trench.

Rising to the ChallengeMark Taylor, Design Manager at Mastenbroek for over 30 years, says, The tougher and more arduous the conditions, the more we rise to the challenge and weve been using Autodesk Inventor to help us do this from the R4 days. Over the years, this has been of major benefit and not just on staffing levels. He explains, Yes, with Inventor, you can do a lot more with fewer people but we dont use Inventor to shorten design times. Instead, we invest as much time as we can to produce high quality designs to save a huge amount of man hours in the manufacturing process. He continues, It is very rare that we build two machines the same so the more work we can do to make the design complete before we hand it over to make, the less non-productive workshop hours there are.

35,000 or more partsMark reports, We are always busy and if we are not working on machines in the workshops, we are working on new designs and on prototypes. We really are pushing Inventor very hard and have always been up there with our use of large models and complex assemblies. He says, Our largest machines comprise around 35,000 parts. Even our smallest machines will have between 6,000 and 8,000 parts, from washers to mainframe. We need them all there on screen, so we can simulate machine operation using driven constraints rotating and lifting things up and down, exercising the moving parts. It is no good doing that on partial models or in wireframe. Mark continues, However, Its not just the sheer number of parts that count. The physically larger parts in our machines can be quite complex in themselves with complex curves etc., which means that there is more data required to describe those parts.

ATI FirePro V5700 comes into its ownThat, according to Mark, is where the ATI FirePro V5700 workstation graphics accelerator comes in. He explains, As we demanded more and more from successive release of Inventor we were getting frustrated by graphics card performance issues extended loading times, irregular motion and overshoot when using the Spaceball to manipulate large models on screen and slow regeneration of models. Mark adds, With the FirePro V5700, everything is very smooth indeed rotation, panning, zooming. Regeneration speed is a lot faster and the quality of visualisation is a lot better. Not only does the real-time rendered model look better and more convincing, it is easier to see the extent of any projecting external parts.

Case Study | Mastenbroek Ltd: digging deep with Autodesk Inventor and ATI FirePro V5700

The HR 65+ with 27,938 parts, takes just 3 minutes to load.

Mastenbroek Ltd serves the cable and pipe laying industries for utility, offshore and agricultural applications across the world.

Driving out workshop hoursThe time to load and open a particular model in Inventor has reduced dramatically using the complete package of new graphics and workstation hardware, as Mark testifies. He says, Loading the full model of our 1012D Compact machine, all 5,500 parts, is down from over five minutes to just one minute. Loading the HR-65, all 22,363 parts, is down from eight minutes to less than three minute. Even the HR 65+ with 27,938 parts, takes just 31/2 minutes to load. Mark adds, Overall, we can open a model up to ten times a day, saving up to five minutes each time. We can invest the time saved to make a better design, so for each hour saved in that way, we can save up to six hours workshop time.

A brilliant sales toolWe run an open house here, says Mark. Two or three times a week, a salesman might bring a customer in to the design office at any time without notice and will ask to see how the design is progressing. We have the confidence to hold such meetings around the CAD system, show the concept and the design and make changes there and then with the customer. As a result, says Mark, It banishes the well have to get back to you on that response. He continues, People lose interest if the visualisation is poor and with half a dozen customers looking over your shoulder, the last thing they want to see is a jerky model with slow regeneration. We want the customer to go away with that wow feeling, captivated by what we do. With the V5700, they do exactly that.

Realistic and appealing visualisationThere are quality benefits, too, according to Mark, who says, Lines are a lot crisper and the model does not block out when you rotate it. The amount of data that is being handled has not changed but the way it is handled is much better. Visually and aesthetically, it is much improved. You get a quality image with no jagged edges, something we can sell from, for a salesman to show a customer in real time. The more realistic and visually appealing the visualisation, the more it makes for success. That carries over to the printing, too.

Less stressful and less tiringPaul Rogers, Design Engineer, agrees, Anything that makes my daily design time a better experience, easier on the eye, visually less stressful, makes my day easier and less tiring. The V5700 speeds up the way we can exercise the moving parts. Things dont stagger and stutter, disappear and come back, that sort of thing. The animations are much more realistic, and it is all done within Inventor.

Successful move to Vista 64Most of what we do is new, so the workshop staff wont have seen it before. We can now show them exactly what they are going to build. We load a second copy of Inventor so that we can load two

models the one we are working on and the one weve been asked to show. We may be handing 40,000 parts or more. That we can do this is down to Vista 64 and the hardware including the V5700 card. Im fully confident now to move our other two machines away from Windows XP and on to Vista 64. Id have no hesitation. What gives me added confidence is that Microsoft developed Vista 64 on the Athlon X2 7750v that we are using so it should work well, which it does. What we do is pretty high-end and Im sure if works for us, there are a lot of people out there who can make the move, too. If someone in a similar line of work was to ask how we did all this, Id tell them and Id say use the V5700 card. Its eminently suitable for our sort of high end 3D modelling. Its allowed us to push Inventor and push ourselves, too. We never stand still at Mastenbroek.

Copyright 2009. Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. All rights reserved. AMD, ATI, the ATI logo, FireGL, FirePro and combinations there of are trademarks of Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. Microsoft Windows and Vista are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and other countries. All other company and/or product names are for informational purposes only and may be trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their respective owners.

Links

www.mastenbroek.com

www.hardrocktrenching.com

ati.amd.com/products/firepro/index.html

www.autodesk.com/inventor

Acknowledgments

Text - John Marchant, the skilstream partnership

Images Courtesy of Mastenbroek Ltd