Survey: Has the Economy Affected Your Shop?

BPB:

Son of a Bleach! It seems my "arctic" comment wasn't far off, eh? I was just grumbling yesterday because I had to put on a jacket when I went out, as it was "freezing out" actually, 52 degrees.

Jon

Actually it's fairly unusual to get much snow here but since we do have about 4in fresh as of it as of just a few minutes ago, and beings our driveway is gravel, appx 1/8 mile long, and also has a couple of fairly steep areas...

Steve:

Jeeze, sorry to hear about your dad. It looks like they caught it in time. Gunner has had a stent for years and he's pretty active, so I would think your dad's recovery should be fine. Just don't give him any banzai rides on the back of your bike. :)

Now that's the kind of employer attitude that makes you want to go the extra mile for them.

Glad to see that there are still a few shops out there that value loyalty from both the employee and employer's standpoint.

Be nice to have a tractor, but gross overkill for me. My problem is my driveway's all uphill. Any time it gets above freezing, snow melts and runs down tire tracks, then freezes at night. It stays frozen until I get enough sun or rain to melt it off. Too much driveway to shovel anymore. One of my best friends from high school just died of heart failure. Spent 8 months training for a swim from Alcatraz to Aquatic Park, 1.2 miles in the SF bay. Made the swim and the next day, collapsed and died. I'm not in the shape he was in, so I'm rather leery of overexerting myself right now....

I come down the driveway to the far right, turn left. Soon as it starts turning, I yank on the parking brake to start the ass end swinging around, then pop the clutch and try to powerslide most of the rest of the way around. It's fun and works great when the snow is soft. This morning, well, can't win them all... Looks like you live in some right pretty country!

Jon

Visco, American, Green

We're a job shop. We make components for medical devices (like vacuum regulators or tiny fluid/gas manifolds), scientific instruments (like gas chromatographs), and parts for auto racing (like pistons for high-perfomance shock absorbers). Over the past two years, we've been getting more and more bone screws, spinal implants, and the parts that go with them.

The company's "personality" is that we run multi-spindle mill/turn equipment, including Swiss types. We put bar stock in one end, and get finished parts out the other end - including in-process deburring, and things that most shops would consider secondary operations. We also have a couple 5 axis mills. We're good at small parts (under 6" cube, typically, and down to little needle-like things) with lots of features and dimensions, close tolerances, and difficult or tight relationships from one axis or surface to another.

We spend a lot of skill and effort on setups, but then run with very little operator intervention, and often fully unmanned for long periods. We even ship work to some of our customers' assembly plants in China.

I feel for those who are getting pinched by the economy; but for me, life is very, very busy.

KG

Go to

Call bullshit if you like; but calling for a job interview is better

- if you're good enough, that is.

KG

And in case you're interested enough to take a look at the equipment list, we're adding 4 new Mazak Integrex machines in January, 2 more in June, plus another Star SR type, as soon as we can figure out where to put it. The Mazak SQT's and older Multiplex's will be replaced next year too. There are a couple Matsuura pallet-pool machining centers in the mix someplace; but we're still looking for floor-space before we can take delivery.

KG

Kirk:

Saw the pictures of your shop. Real spiffy!

=========== Wonderful to hear that your shop is doing well.

Have a Merry Xmas, and wonderful New Year (and keep up the good work).

Unka' George [George McDuffee]

------------------------------------------- He that will not apply new remedies, must expect new evils: for Time is the greatest innovator: and if Time, of course, alter things to the worse, and wisdom and counsel shall not alter them to the better, what shall be the end?

Francis Bacon (1561-1626), English philosopher, essayist, statesman. Essays, "Of Innovations" (1597-1625).

I think we need a new monthly award category: Who has the biggest matchining dick on AMC?

The pre-eminent KG is def'ly in the running.

NOTE: This is NOT the same award category as: Who IS the biggest dick on AMC?

That award, by default, goes to jb, each and every effing month, of each and every effing year. BD would occasionally vie for the honor, but we have apparently bonded now, so I shan't make a ruckus.....

But yo, I see the ratio of lathes to mills is 11 to 1. Seems kinda high, for a job shop. Is there a "typical" ratio for a job shop? I guess it would depend on how many axes the lathes have. In essence, these super lathese *are* small mills.

Also, Kirk, what manual machines do you have?

And why are all these shops ahm seein so well lit and clean? goodgawd....

The lathe/mill ratio is deceiving. All the round machines are 8 axes or more. They can mill, drill, cross-tap at funny compound angles, and pretty much do everything except left-handed four-dimensional hyperbolic retrocirculation. And the only reason they won't do that is that we're too busy to play with the programming.

We actually make a lot of prismatic parts, including some with no diameters at all, on the lathes. Small parts can be made from bars, cut off when all the milling and drilling is done, and dropped into a parts catcher - fully automatic and hands-off. To do them on a machining center, we'd need sawn blanks, and special fixtures (instead of just collets), and we'd need to handle and load the parts at least twice. The lathes are all twin opposed spindles with twin turrets, or are Swiss types with sub spindles, and tools pointing every which way. So machining all 6 (or more) sides of even a cubic workpiece is more efficient and more fully automatic than it would be on a mill.

The mills do mostly castings, which are sorta tough to bar-feed, or things that are long and springy enough that they want to be held in a vise or fixture, instead of hanging out of a collet. But even the long springy stuff goes into the Swiss machines if it's small enough.

Sadly, we don't have ANY manual machines, unless you count an ancient sinker EDM that does a couple funny features on some really specialized jobs. We desperately need a real tool room, but every time we find or rent an extra square inch of floor space, the owner buys more CNC's. There's a real, custom building in our future though, and that'll have a Bridgeport and some grinders in it if I have to sneak them in myself on a Sunday night.

KG

KG