Growth in Branded Customized Industrial Enclosures and Challenges…!

Industrial Enclosure prevents machines and wiring from direct contact with humans and other external bodies that can create an accident or damage human life or machine. This cabinet requires standard practice in manufacturing to provide adequate strength & protection for critical components fitted inside.

Contamination and the electrical /electronic device should not gel together if your equipment needs a longer life. Failure of equipment leads to a costly affair of production downtime that’s why people start putting a focus on the better cabinet for their electrical systems.

A few years back Indian market is dominated by local manufacturers & Price of the enclosure was generally quoted on a per kilogram basis and that always carries a risk of poor quality due to no real criteria defined except sheet thickness (Gauge).

Panel builders and machine manufacturers who primarily used their in-house facility also found it difficult to run their facility due to pollution norms, huge capital costs allocated in it, and for the latest certification needs.

The branded manufacturers of the Industrial enclosure not only concentrate on the safety aspect of it but also on the attractiveness, to make the enclosure pleasing to the eye. This article highlight quality, cost and changing demand pattern for an electrical enclosure.

The enclosure is now made with standard rules & certification: changing scenario and demand from critical application forces supplier to use standard rules in enclosure manufacturing. Usually, Enclosure is selected based on below parameters→

Sheet Steel Thickness & Grade, Paint/Power Coating thickness & Types, Types of Gasket, Degree of protection, impact strength, and usage like – outdoor or indoor application.

These parameters vary based on the criticality of application and certification to enforce the manufacturer to meet the requirement.

The degree of protection is measured in IP as per IEC 60529 certification, the Impact strength is tested under IK as per IEC 62262 certification. IP & IK Certification ensures the degree of protection under a defined impact load.

A common problem found in a metal enclosure is rusting and the main causes are improper pre-treatment of surface and manual procedure for powder coating. When a manufacturer claims high salt spray life e.g 500 Hrs, 1000Hrs, they need to have set up of 10 tank cleaning, preferably zinc phosphating and spray gun/dip coating shops with the baking facility. The full procedure has to be automated to avoid any manual errors to keep consistency in finish and finally, the product has to be tested for impact, bend test, and paint thickness to ensure quality.

The Gasket plays an important part too of maintaining the IP rating of Industrial enclosures on actual field applications, nowadays all branded enclosures manufacturers are doing a jointless PU gaskets to ensure very long running IP life.

Different kinds of Industrial enclosures like Wall Mounted Boxes, Floor Mounted Panels, Compartmentalised Enclosures, IT Cabinets, and Console Desks are used in Automotive, Food and Beverage, Chemical, Aerospace, Shipbuilding/Off-shore Industry Production Control, Engineering Machine Control, power distribution Control Systems, and Plant engineering applications.

A variety of applications demands more and more customized enclosure sizes, different paint shade specifications, and cutouts. Industrial Enclosures are just like raw material for panel builder, OEMs and they need it as a base to start assembly of devices and wirings if the customer needs to make cutouts or make accessories brackets that again increase their delivery cycle time so the customer is looking for branded customized enclosure ready to use and it reduces their cycle time.

Customization in size with low volume is difficult to handle because it requires effort to be done from design-build to manufacturing and many global companies are not able to handle it easily and another customization is for cutouts that can be handled in two ways by doing cut out on fully finished enclosure or doing cut out while manufacturing the enclosures.

Customization in enclosure still ensures IP & IK certification by following the same procedure as followed in certified enclosures.

Consistency, flexibility & modularity in branded enclosures attract many machine manufacturers and OEM to use a branded enclosure that brings praise for their machine and panel as outer cabinet quality impress the end user. Warranty, approvals & certification for a branded enclosure is another driving factor.

Usually, enclosure cost is very less 3-5% of machine cost and approx. 8-12 % in electrical distribution panels but the capital cost is huge to run the enclosure manufacturing facility and maintaining the stringent pollution norms for welding, Electroplating & paint shop.

Growth in branded customized enclosure demand is happening due to the growth of existing customer, customer shifting for branded enclosure from a local fabricator, proven & tested products from branded manufacturers, and standard certification availability for the export market.

Handling low volume customization is always a challenge for Branded enclosure manufacturer because there will be no stock and they will never able to make extra quantity due to uncertainty in order schedule.

To cater Customised Enclosures, more steps to be followed over standard listed enclosures like New prices Quote, drawing approvals, new machine program and component drawings, etc., Need more resources to deliver the customized enclosure. A customer always advised to pre-plan the enclosure ordering and cut down some variations to keep fewer nos. of a variant to get faster delivery.