Case New Holland (CNH), a leading agricultural and construction equipment Company, has eleven integrated Virtual Reality (VR) systems from Virtalis.

The fully tracked ActiveWalls are situated in Zedelgem, Belgium, Lancaster, PA, Burr Ridge, IL, Burlington, VT and Fargo, ND in the US and Modena, and Lecce in Italy, plus two 3D TV systems in Belo Horizonte, Brazil and Wichita, KA, US, as well as two Head Mounted Display (HMD) based systems, known as ActiveSpaces, in Curitiba, US and Burr Ridge, IL. Now, with the advent of 4k projectors and software capable of higher quality rendering, the global capital goods company has begun upgrading its Virtalis ActiveWalls. The improvement in the screen resolution enables tractor, bulldozer and combine harvester teams to walk right up to the screen to examine components or new features in more detail.

CNH is part of the Fiat Group and Virtalis has also installed several immersive ActiveWorks systems at Elasis, Fiat’s research organisation over the past decade.

“We use our virtual reality systems on a daily basis to conduct collaborative design reviews. The fact that we’ve now managed to link up our teams with their international colleagues, has led to a great deal less international travel and accelerated development schedules.” Kezhun Li, Head of Digital Prototyping and Simulation (DP&S)

THE JOURNEY

When CNH began investigating advanced visualisation and its associated technologies, it sought guidance from other parts of the Fiat Group as well as Virtalis. Gennaro Monacelli, manager at Elasis in Italy, takes up the story: “Our VR development has always been supported by Virtalis. We created some demos to help CNH’s managers to better understand the potentialities of VR technologies in their product development process. Following Elasis’ recommendation, CNH selected Virtalis as the technical partner for the system’s integration.”

THE SPECIFICATION

All seven Virtalis ActiveWall systems have very similar specifications that enable efficient collaborative working between them. The Virtalis ActiveWall configuration boasts a massive 25ft by 14ft screen which has been slightly sunken into the floor so that the combine harvesters and balers can drive out of the wall in full stereoscopic 3D, powered by a Christie 4k projector.

Virtalis implemented tailored Intersense IS900 Wireless VETracker systems, so that natural movement around the virtual models is maximised. The VR conferencing capabilities in the VR suites boast the latest speakers and microphones.

The ActiveSpaces use nVisor SX Head-Mounted Displays from NVIS. Since the virtual models CNH creates have more than 20,000 parts, compute power and graphics rendering capability are vital. The latest Virtalis systems at CNH feature 64-bit, quad-core [Dell] workstations coupled with NVIDIA FX5600 graphics cards.

CONFIGURATION COMBINATIONS

At CNH’s Burr Ridge site, the ActiveWall is linked to an ActiveSpace to enable one user to be fully immersed while his tracked movements are followed by the audience viewing the ActiveWall stereoscopically. This can be used for anything from analysing assembly processes to ergonomic analysis of visibility.

“We are proud to report that we are using our new system to its fullest extent.  We are using the tracking system for interactive design reviews and design concept evaluations.  Our ActiveSpace is proving invaluable for cab visibility tests, while we are using our Cyberglove for reachability studies.  All three pieces of kit work together reliably and in many combinations.  The integration is seamless and the whole system was reasonably priced.”
Kezhun Li, Head of DP&S

INCORPORATING VR INTO CORE METHODOLOGIES

CNH designs and manufactures numerous different platforms and products, with the different regions specialising in different machines and becoming business centres for those vehicles. By adopting the same VR technology across its sites in Europe and America, the company has been able to carry out international design reviews.

CNH’s ProE CAD is seamlessly imported into Virtalis’ Visionary Render software. Tasks like assessing a cab’s ergonomics are transformed when the virtual prototype is viewed in a VR environment.

“With the ability to adjust everything on screen, we’ve quickly become less forgiving of rework and have already had great success with our safety reviews for our new combines. The fact that we were able to hold these safety reviews at three locations simultaneously undoubtedly saved a great deal of time. We were concerned about the position of service steps and whether they were sufficiently far from hot components and rails. We were able to measure the actual distance on the virtual model, so what would have become an “action item” on an agenda was addressed straight away. In the span of only two or three hours, we completed the whole collaborative process, without anyone travelling and with answers nine months before the launch.”
Jeroen De Neve, simulation engineer at CNH, Belgium

VR FOR MARKETING

The CNH team has used its ActiveWalls to develop new cabs and to carry out styling reviews. VR is commonly used for design and milestone reviews, but CNH is also using its Virtalis systems for market research and marketing.

Each new program hosts a couple of day-long focus groups where the interior and exterior styling, initial impressions and control positions and visibility are all monitored. “Our Virtual Reality rooms are where all new product concepts can be experienced virtually; years ahead of their actual market launch. The entire development team, including engineers, designers, branding specialists, stylists, manufacturing engineers and maintenance engineers review the virtual models of the prototype, sometimes bringing customers into the mix, so we can better evaluate product performance, in areas such as ergonomics and comfort. These sessions enable us to fully explore the new, innovative features of a future product,” said Gennaro Monacelli, head of Innovation, Simulation and Methods at CNH Industrial. CNH believes VR has helped them get closer to their customer base and to get their buy-in prior to product launch.

“Our Virtalis VR systems have undoubtedly saved a great deal of travelling, as engineers can now meet virtually, collaborate and consult with each other over the model in real-time. As a result, our VR centers are used daily by small and large groups.”
Andrew Brokaw, CNH design analysis engineer

VR BENEFITS

CNH’s use of VR during the last decade has not only significantly shortened its design cycle, but increased communication between other stakeholders, including customers too.
Virtual mannequins are deployed to interact with the virtual prototype to test for safety, ease of servicing and operability. The ability to brainstorm in 3D has led to the CNH design engineers feeling that they are ahead of the curve technologically.

“Our customers have reacted positively to the VR experience, because they feel like we are showing them the future, which we are! After these sessions, we not only identify problems in VR, we solve them too.”
Alex Theis, a project engineer working alongside the Product Validation Group at CNH Burlington, IA

“We’ve also taken Virtalis’ ActiveView software to a new level,” explained Brokaw. “Thanks to some bespoke work by Andy Connell, Virtalis’ technical director, we’ve moved beyond picture in picture views to sharing virtual scenes in real time and streaming 3D data over the network, so our teams can benefit from collaborative virtual sessions. Watching a VR model being manipulated in real-time from the other side of the world certainly gives you the wow factor!”

CNH PROFILE

CNH Case New Holland is a world leader in the agricultural and construction equipment businesses. Created in 1999 through the merger of New Holland N.V. and Case Corporation, CNH is a global company, supported by 39 manufacturing facilities in Europe, North America, Latin America, China, India and Uzbekistan.
One in three combine harvesters and backhoe loaders and one in four tractors and skid steer loaders sold worldwide come from CNH. The Fiat Group is a leading Italian corporation focused on the automotive sector since its foundation over 100 years ago. In addition to the CNH brands, it manufactures Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Ferrari, Lancia, and Maserati cars, and Iveco trucks and commercial vehicles.