ETBO has become a one-stop shop for tooling and stamping services.

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Even though the company has been in the stamping and tooling business for more than 50 years, ETBO Tool & Die is very much a modern operation. Plant Manager Etienne Borm says the company’s capabilities give it the ability to provide customers with practically every service they would need. “Our company is focused on being the one-source solution for our customers, a one-stop shop,” Borm says.    

The company’s focus on developing tools with advanced engineering gives it a great success rate when building tools for customers. In addition, ETBO complements its engineering with an array of stamping services including tool manufacturing, automation, full-service production and die service.     

Borm says the company’s 40,000-square-foot facility in Aylmer, Ontario, Canada, is one of the most modern in the industry. From there, ETBO provides stamping solutions for thin metal components, complex forms, precision stampings and structural parts. The company’s stamping capabilities range from 30 tons up to 600 tons. ETBO builds tooling and stamps a variety of parts such as shields, gaskets, electrical terminals and brackets.

Technical Expertise
Before a single cut is made in a piece of metal, ETBO studies the design of each die and approaches each project with a strong background in engineering. “We look at our projects’ potential failure modes in a scientific way using the most advanced forming analysis software available,” Borm says.   

The company performs all of its tool design in-house and, when necessary, completely models complex forming before setting to work on a tool design. Borm says this separates ETBO from the competition by removing the guesswork. “By doing the upfront analysis on the part, it allows us to fully understand potential failure risks,” he says.    

ETBO also monitors the parts while they are being stamped. “For in-tool automation, we have advanced capabilities,” Borm explains.    

The company has been performing in-die measuring for more than 15 years, so it has become skilled at measuring parts as they are running. Borm says ETBO can measure inside a tool to within 0.0002 inches. Part measurements are recorded during production to allow for real-time evaluation and re­sponse.    

Borm adds that the company’s in-die measuring capabilities also make it possible for ETBO to send detailed data for each part along with a customer’s order.    

“It provides real peace of mind to people who are looking for zero PPM [defective parts per million],” he says. “The benefit to the customer is quality assurance, industry-leading delivery and decreased costs.”   

In-die measuring has been a major focus for the company in recent years because it anticipated the de­mand for such services. “We strongly believe that an upcoming focus in the industry is to include as much value-added processing inside a tool while it is running in the press,” Borm says.    

While this technology has been paramount for high-volume and precision parts, it has also contributed to advances in low-volume tooling and production. Borm says “many customers have lower-volume part requirements and we apply our enhanced processes to ensure they receive stable, low-cost supply.”

All-In-One
ETBO’s position as a one-stop shop in the marketplace provides considerable advantages to customers. “[We provide] the engineering, tooling, stamping and automation, so the customer doesn’t have to go to multiple suppliers,” Controller Heather Borm says. “We’re the one source to obtain all of these services.”   

With only one level to deal with, ETBO’s customers don’t have to worry about the details of their components being lost in translation between multiple suppliers. “We noticed in many cases that there’s a significant loss of information when a customer deals only with a traditional stamper,” Etienne Borm says.     

For example, Heather Borm notes, one customer originally purchased a tool from one shop and a rivet insertion automation cell from another. The customer spent more than a year unsuccessfully trying to integrate the two systems before finally turning to ETBO who, in a short period of time, was able to bring the project on-line.   

The company has expended significant time and energy on “a mission of continuous R&D,” to get to this stage, Etienne Borm says. Though every project requires custom design and manufacturing, ETBO has developed its tool-making facility to operate in a production-like environment. As a result, ETBO improved its efficiency, capacity and cost competitiveness.   

In addition to tooling and automation development, ETBO is working to improve other internal processes.  In fact, it has been working on an initiative to program its own enterprise resource planning system for the past two years. The system fully integrates ETBO’s design, manufacturing, shipping and receiving into one streamlined process.