zimmer

aidanki

hi all,

I know zimmer have a factory in shannon making knees. in the broader scheme of things what does anyone know about them are they world leaders, do they have much automation etc etc

doing some research on them at the min

They wouldn't really be automated as such compared to what an automated production line would be like. An operator would load the metal forging into a CNC machine and the part would be cut or turned. There may or may not be other downstream machines for deburring or grinding etc or it may be done manually on belts. The orthopaedic industry as such isn't largely automated, although I hear Stryker in Limerick are automating their plant, I know nothing of the detail though. In the broader scheme of things they wouldn't be World leaders compared to Stryker or Depuy in the Orthopaedic sector. Zimmer is €2.6 billion public traded company according to themselves, not huge by any means. Zimmer in Limerick is in the early days and doesn't have much capacity at the moment.

I worked as a Quality Engineer on an "automated line" producing catheters and strictly speaking compared to the likes of a pharmaceutical plant it's not really that automated when you consider the number of operators still required.

mawk

Stryker recently automated, depuy did it years ago but currently are replacing the 5axis robots (think car manufacture) with something new and much more simple. More effective too apparently. But not on line yet.

Afaik zimmer is all manual linishing and polishing.
I might be incorrect, never been in there