CHALLENGE & GOALS

TADANO FAUN GmbH is a leader in the development and manufacture of all-terrain cranes, which are characterized by their road and off-road capability, and also produces truck-mounted cranes. In the last decades of its company history, TADANO has produced and successfully delivered lifting equipment for more than half a million lifting vehicles.

For a series from the all-terrain crane product range, solutions were to be found for a design optimization approach to reduce the cost and weight of the cladding and covers.

Tadano wanted:

• Cost transparency and advance calculation of expected savings
• Identification of specific savings potential through material substitution, variant reduction and the use of new technologies
• Know-how transfer for Tadano employees

PROBLEM & SOLUTION

At the beginning of the project, the upper body cladding assemblies were analyzed, cost-analytically evaluated and the cost drivers determined. The different functions of the assemblies could then be worked out and scrutinized. New technologies and functional solutions were identified in joint creative workshops and compared in a morphological box. This made it possible to identify combinations of solutions that led to a significant reduction in manufacturing costs.

“In addition, the approach and new solutions for design tasks were communicated to the project team and worked out together,” explains Stefan Altmann, Manager Design and Development. “We got to know BERODE as a professional company that quickly and purposefully developed constructive suggestions for improvement thanks to its analytical approach based on extensive specialist knowledge. Our expectations were more than fulfilled.”