What do the U.S. rock band Kiss and legendary German jazz saxophonist Klaus Doldinger have in common?
It’s not leather, face paint and platform shoes. It’s a shared love of speakers manufactured by ADAM Audio in Berlin, Germany.
ADAM Audio—the name is an acronym for advanced dynamic audio monitors—was founded in 1999. The company initially made its mark with the ART tweeter, a refinement of the air motion transformer designed in the 1960s by German electrical engineer and inventor Oskar Heil. Instead of producing sound by means of a vibrating diaphragm, the ART (accelerating ribbon technology) employs a pleated diaphragm capable of moving the air four times faster than its own folds.
Since then, the company began making a variety of speakers, subwoofers and even headphones. ADAM’s products have earned a worldwide reputation as the preferred speakers for musicians, sound engineers, recording studios, podcasters and audiophiles. Today, the company produces some 75,000 studio speakers each year.
The height of the moduhub assembly table from Roemheld can be adjusted via two electric lifting columns. Photo courtesy ADAM Audio
Reorganizing Manual Assembly
ADAM’s high-end line of speakers, the S Series, is assembled by hand at the company’s factory in Berlin. These speakers pose a physical challenge to assemblers. The largest model weighs 176 pounds and measures 17 inches tall, 35 inches wide and 20 inches deep. Simply moving the speaker around disrupted productivity. Two people are needed to move the speaker from one workstation to another, so one assembler would invariably have to stop working to help a colleague make the transfer.
For Alexandra Brau, production manager at ADAM Audio, it was clear that the manual assembly area had to be reorganized. “We wanted to be flexible and create an innovative working environment that also meets the high standards we set for our products,” she says. “We did not want a standard solution, and we did not want an assembly line.”
Brau had three goals for the reorganization. First, assemblers should be able to push or pull speakers during transfers, instead of lifting them. Second, the worktables should be adjustable in height. For safety reasons, it was important that the height of the work surface could only be changed on demand. Brau did not want any accidental drops of the work surface. Finally, lifting and lowering must be vibration-free and jerk-free to avoid damaging the speakers.
Looking for quick answers on assembly and manufacturing topics?
Try Ask ASM, our new smart AI search tool.
Ask ASM
Adjustable Assembly Tables
After extensive research, ADAM decided on moduhub assembly tables from Roemheld GmbH in Laubach, Germany, a suburb of Frankfurt. The height of the tables can be adjusted via two electric lifting columns. The tabletops—each 3,000 millimeters wide, 800 millimeters deep and 60 millimeters thick—carry a load of up to 880 pounds.
Roemheld offers a range of modular products for ergonomic and efficient manual assembly of medium and heavyweight workpieces. The range includes various manually or electrically operated swivel, tilt, lift, carriage and clamping modules that can be combined with each other. The lifting modules used by ADAM are available in multiple versions: with strokes between 200 and 1,000 millimeters, manually or electrically operated, and with lifting forces from 1 to 6 kilonewtons.
The moduhub assembly table can carry a load of up to 880 pounds. Photo courtesy ADAM Audio
At ADAM, the assembly tables are at the heart of the reorganization. Their operation is simple and safe. To raise or lower the height of the worksurface, assemblers simply need to push a button on a control panel. As long as the button is pressed, the two lifting columns move up or down synchronously, evenly and quietly at a speed of between 12 and 16 millimeters per second, depending on the load. If the button is released, the lifting columns stop immediately.
Different positions can be preset and recalled from memory. The electrically controlled soft start and stop also contribute to the ease of use.
To mount a speaker or subwoofer, the assembler moves the components to his worktable on a transport trolley. From memory, the table adjusts its height to be slightly lower than that of the trolley, so that the assembler can pull all components onto his work surface comfortably and without help. Next, the assembler adjusts the height of the tabletop to the optimal position based on his stature and the size of the speaker.
After assembly, he positions the work surface to be slightly higher than that of the transport trolley (that position is also stored in memory) and pulls the fully assembled speaker onto the trolley.
The speaker then goes to a colleague for quality control.
The moduhub worktable is available with strokes between 200 and 1,000 millimeters. Height can be changed manually or electrically. Lifting forces range from 1 to 6 kilonewtons. Photo courtesy ADAM Audio
Fewer Back Problems and Faster Production
The new worktables have been met with a lot of approval. “The satisfaction of the employees is high. There are significantly fewer complaints about back problems and the number of absences due to illness has decreased,” Brau says.
The assemblers also praise the fact that they can now position speakers more easily to access hard-to-reach areas. In addition, the ability to raise and lower the height of the workpiece on demand allows assemblers to maximize available light for their work inside the recesses of a speaker.
For Brau, productivity improvement is also important. Instead of having to wait for the help of a colleague to move the heavy monitors, assemblers can now complete transfers independently and without delay.
For more information on work-positioning devices, visit https://ah.roemheld-usa.com or visit the company’s booth at The ASSEMBLY Show.
For more information on work-holding and work-positioning devices, read these articles:
Positioning Equipment Improves Ergonomics for Medical Device Assembler
Flexible Positioning for Manual Assembly
Hold It: What’s New With Clamping and Workholding Technology
