Shim-sizing Triumph camshafts
Original article date: June 2000
Pilz’s Pipanel Touch is now used at Triumph to calculate shim sizes required, specific to each engine against default sizes.
Thunderbird, Daytona and Tiger… To any discerning motorcycle enthusiast, these names conjure up a unique image of highly desirable, technologically advanced motorcycles. In a word, Triumph.
With its sophisticated engine systems, combined with attention to detail and a commitment to quality, Triumph ranks as a top name in the British motorcycle industry, and worldwide.
Based in Hinckley, employing over 600 staff and producing 100 motorcycles per day, Triumph is one of the British success stories of the 90s. Production lines are automated wherever possible and are as advanced as any in the world.
One way in which production has been streamlined is in the shim-sizing process for camshafts in the engine. Previously the size of the default shims was calculated manually and shims were measured to fit particular engine models. Shim sizes often had to be re-calculated, the shims removed, re-sized, re-measured and refitted until a perfect fit was achieved. This had always been something of a laborious process taking two people as many as four cycles per shim.
The solution to the problem lay in a high-performance industrial computer which could be used for telemetry purposes and would be compatible with the software designed by Triumph. Specifications would also have to include a touchscreen which could be easily navigated when wearing gloves, and would offer a clear bright screen together with a housing resistant to the chemicals and minerals found in engine oil.
Pilz’s Pipanel Touch is now used to calculate shim sizes required, specific to each engine against default sizes. Default shims are fitted into the engine as standard at the start of the process. The operator measures any differential that may occur. Results are input into the computer and the correct size required to make up the differential is calculated automatically. This method has eliminated the need for the re-checking and re-calculation process which previously was performed manually. Pipanel Touch operates using in-house, DOS-based software. And since Triumph has installed the industrial PC, the program has been further amended.
- Pilz
June 2000