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Brescia aluminum foundries set the bar high in Indianapolis. Brescia computer scientist Catterina stars at Nadca Die Casting
The Brescia Newspaper, Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2024
by ENRICO GIUSTACCHINI
PREVALLE. The leading aluminum foundry technical congress in the United States also speaks Brescian. In recent days, the Nadca DieCasting Congress and Exposition, held in Indianapolis, had among its guests Paolo Catterina, a computer scientist from Prevalle who has been developing systems for the American Visi-Trak for 15 years. Two projects were presented, in synergy with as many companies operating in process control systems for die casting, Brescia-based Imago Vision (a company that designs artificial vision systems dedicated to quality control and production tracking) and Milan-based Gefond.
Projects.
The first, illustrated by Francesco Magri of Imago, gave an account of the outcomes of the application of an advanced methodology
of quality control that makes use of 3D vision systems combined with infrared vision to inspect die castings during the production cycle. Imago's Mhira3D system, used in innovative ways in the La Cibek foundry in Cazzago San Martino, has achieved impressive results in automating quality inspections of die-cast components.
Particularly attracting attention was a predictive maintenance system based on Artificial Intelligence techniques that, through various sensors applied to machinery, allows early notification of anomalies and breakdowns, before they can cause plant downtime. Instead, it was Paolo Catterina himself who described Gefond's Perpetuo system at the congress, giving an account of experiences conducted in some foundries in our province with important results in terms of effective prevention of breakdowns and failures, results achieved thanks to the introduction of Machine Learning techniques, typical
of artificial intelligence, even in this industrial sector. Sector that was represented in Indianapolis by numerous
companies from Brescia: in fact, exhibitors from all over the world included Colosio, Idra, Ieci, Italpresse Gauss, and Meccanica PiErre.
ENRICO GIUSTACCHINI