Articles & Columns

After acquiring my first iPhone, I searched the Internet for apps to use in the shop. I found 70 hits for “machinist” or “machining” and 45 for “cutting tool.” Conversely, there were 11,169 hits for movie apps and 37,616 for music apps.

Ceramic core material that improves jet engine fuel efficiency.

A journey of waste reduction and continuous improvement for machine shops.

I don't like bringing this up, but two key metalworking markets -- defense and energy -- are in a bit of trouble.

Cast beryllium-aluminum parts.

Accurately machine EDM electrodes used to produce micromolds for medical parts. A high-speed, high-precision, 3-axis micro milling machine.

A shop I once worked at had a beautiful cast iron welding table. It was 5' wide × 12' long and had started life as a surface plate for assembling diesel engines. The owner bought it at auction for $100. With a screen in the middle, two guys could work on it at once.

Table-type horizontal boring mills add versatility to machine shops.

Introduced in 1959, coordinate measuring machines have become increasingly common over the last 2 decades. The complexity and cost once meant CMMs were only suitable for large manufacturers. Advances in CMM technology and manufacturing techniques have reduced the cost of ownership, and the machines are now found at all types and sizes of shops.

An off-the-shelf robotic gripper that conforms to a variety of parts shapes without reprogramming.

Welcome to the start of another year, where machine shops will be pushed to adhere to even stricter standards as customers deal with consolidation, relocation, certification, lean-system implementation and other versions of doing more with less.

Do you process existing jobs the same way every time? If not, you may be throwing money away every time those jobs are run by having to reinvent the process over and over. If a few weeks or months go by in between runs of the same part, you may forget some nuance, whether it's a specific cutter, a dedicated fixture or a unique method for locating the part.

Joe's struggling to package a truckload of parts before noon. Mary can't keep up on the painting line. Jimmy's in trouble with the boss because he can't make quota. These are just a few of the challenges faced by workers on the manufacturing floor, problems that, in many cases, can be solved with collaborative robots.

Imagine building a ship in a bottle, but instead of using a preexisting bottle, you build the ship along with the bottle while machining the ship's and bottle's surfaces as you go.

It's quite common for CAM software to come with built-in simulation to identify potential collisions and optimize virtual machining. However, most versions don't deliver the experience of programming in the context of the NC machine and instead rely on third-party machine simulation to connect the processes. To visualize a toolpath simulation in the context of the NC machine, the programmer must transfer a machine code (ISO or G code) generated from a post-processor to the simulation software.

Capacitance sensors are noncontact sensors used in machine tools to measure the distance between a noncontact probe and a target sensor. Because the probe does not physically touch the target, capacitance sensors are beneficial in instances where the target surface is moving, such as a rotating spindle, or delicate, such as a silicon wafer.

Streamline the digital parts library used to produce workholders. Strategic parts management software.

Deep holes can be difficult to define, but knowing the right tool for the job makes them easier to drill.

A technique I call roll grinding is used to finish corners to match bend radii. Long weld seams that need to be rounded can be handled using a rolling technique with the disc grinder. It takes a little practice, but once you've mastered it, the results look just like a formed corner.

Wedge, cam, square and pull-down clamps, micro vises and chucks, hexagons and rounds. These are just some of the workholding options available to shops that mill small workpieces. Finding the right clamps isn't a problem, but how they're utilized may be. This article examines some of the options and provides tips on how to use them.