Actually Chris has really mellowed on His Mazak opinion. I always wondered how much of peoples experiance is based on local reps. Alot I suspect. There is a large brand in the Dayton area that no one will touch after various shops bought several machines and they think service after the sale does not matter? Salesman told me they lose money on $115 hr. repair work. (was not Mazak)

quote: But seriously, I don’t think our company would have been ready for this machine any earlier. Good insight, that machine would sink most shops and a few will rise to a higher plane. Your shop owner is just one of those owners, right market, right people and I am sure He is just better at Business. I have seen shop owners with everything paid for and making "obscene amounts of money" eventually grow until they fall over. (market changes, owner is up to 200 people and not hungry anymore I guess...kids are working in the family Biz and borrowing too much)..only 15 percent of businesses survive second generation. More Power to you guys and your boss is fortunate to have a guy like you Shawn and he knows it...same for you Crazy..

I know a shop out in Kali was letting workers work on percentage and if they hustled they could make more....well, one guy could not and he complained to the labor board and they said guys were not making overtime pay and fined the company over 300K and almost put them out of Biz. So, they went back to hourly rate...over one person. You gotta be careful what you do, even if its better for the majority.

quote: Go get a sharp / eager kid out of trade school -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- don't know what world you live in but we can't find a creature like that. There is atleast one around here and he has a part time job in a shop and still is in h.S. making a good hourly rate, paid holidays,etc. I know his Mom and the shop owner knows what he has got. I worked on a volunteer church project in which he helped (construction) and I was very impressed with him. That kid will go far. I told him if he ever needs a job to come see me.

quote: Any stories of shops charging for tooling. I understand stuff happens but it has been happening far far to frequently Nope none. If you are going to charge employees for screw ups are you going to give them more money when a job comes in at a double rate because of quoting a high price and getting it. You really make the money in the office..I have noticed over the years that shops can turn over the entire staff and the company keeps on rolling...its the owner that does this..good or bad.

I just bumped a workholding tape discussion to front page for ya.

here ya go

They did have a demo version that I looked at for 30 days...was a few years back..

fair amount of Vietnamese working in machine shops in Denver....they had a reputation as hard workers and always putting their nose into books to learn more during breaks....

http://tciprecision.com/

There use to be a company called TCI ?? in Calif. that specialized in aluminum blanks to your size and they had double disc grinders that grind both sides at the same time.

Funny thing, I have never been able to access the FTP thing until this a.m. I just had a local computer shop do a full re-load of Windows XP after getting a nasty virus that destroyed files. I must have got something in the past...

quote: Kevin, I'm not arguing, but some would argue that the instrument should be some magnitude of higher accuracy then the measurements. That's why I ask. Dave, My blocks are certified to 5 millionths if thats what you mean and the shadow gage easily reads closer than 50 mill as that spacing is around .12 of an inch. as an example. Most of my work has to go thru a certification house and or an fortune 500 co. million dollar plus inspection dept. I do maybe 50 gages a year to 50 millionths and always feel my read end pucker up. (they are all less than one inch thick)...I have almost no re-jections and people love to re-ject gages from what I hear as in "flunking everything" out of some inspection depts. The electronic indicator is graduated 5 millionths also.

quote: I build gages to 50 millionths -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Kevin, Are you talking resolution or accuracy? If you are talking accuracy, how are you measuring, what instruments? Just curious. Dave, Accuracy, and I use inspection level gage blocks and Mitutoyo height masters also (have 3)..so sometimes I use 2 stacks of blocks and average out the build-up.etc and have 3 height masters and will average out the readings on those when used (not for 50 millionths). Have 50 millionths Shadow gages for reading over the blocks which are nice. A cheapo way to do this also is a Mahr supremness 20 millionths comparator from MSC for around $350 I think. They are awesome. I also have lever type indicators with electronic box that go down to .0001 full reading across table. Nothing real sophisticated all surface plate inspection. Holes are jig-ground in and 50 millionths readout compares to the Moore lead-screw within .0001. as a double check. Plain old seat of the pants gagemaking. I have contiplated going to the next level.

My Cincinatti i.d.o.d. grinder keeps moving for the first 2 hrs. of operation until the spindle finally hits operating temp. My Moore jig grinders have a heater built into spindle area that keeps that area heated to 85 degrees so it never changes overnite as that must be a max. number for it to warm up to. My shop is air condtioned to 68 degrees. If I had to make large parts to close tol. I would flood the entire part and machine base with 68 degree coolant and have extra pumps etc to do it. and attach. thermoneters to various areas to see its getting done and have the head at a constant temp. which might mean using a heater in that area like Moore does..

I build gages to 50 millionths (my share) and you have really watch the temp. of coolants contacting gages and the heat from your hand can be a big killer and I don't have all day (gotta get-R-dun) so I keep a pail of coollant at the exact same level of surface plate as I learned a pail on the floor can be cooler than 68 degrees. I check it with a thermometer...same with surface plate, I keep a thermometer on it...I have had gages rejected over 10 millionths and inspectors are wrong alot I have learned.

Description PH 13-8 Mo* stainless is a martensitic precipitation/age-hardening stainless steel capable of high strength and hardness along with good levels of resistance to both general corrosion and stress-corrosion cracking. In addition, the alloy exhibits good ductility and toughness in large sections in both the longitudinal and transverse directions. The excellent properties of PH 13-8 Mo stainless are obtained through close control of chemical composition and microstructure plus specialized melting which reduces impurities and minimizes segregation. Compared to other ferrous-based materials, this alloy offers a high level of useful mechanical properties under severe environmental conditions. 13-8 Mo stainless has good fabrication characteristics and can be age-hardened by a single low temperature treatment. Cold work prior to aging increases the aging, especially for lower aging tempratures. 13-8 Mo stainless has been used for valve parts, fittings, cold-headed and machined fasteners, shafts, landing gear parts, pins, lockwashers, aircraft components, nuclear reactor components and petrochemical applications requiring resistance to stress-corrosion cracking. Generally, this alloy should be considered where high strength, toughness, corrosion resistance, and resistance to stress-corrosion cracking are required in a steel showing minimal directionality in properties. *PH 13-8 Mo stainless is a registered trademark of Armco Inc. Seems like a strange choice. I doubt if you could go wrong with D2...profoundly tough and abrasive resistant. Try grinding some compared to A2 or S7. S7 really shines in fragile "pass cores" on molds that might be flexing a bit when mold closes and it shuts off plastic in an area of part to core out an opening , but is dirty to weld for repair.

Those places are still around

are you checking straightness on the machine? If not, is the part buckled in vise from clamping pressure?

I would flycut it with a single point tool razor sharp with a 45 degree cutting edge (not a point). If you have many of these at some point I would look at adding double disc grinding into the mix.

quote: What would you run it at speed wise I'm will to try almost anything at this point... On long parts and chatter the RPM thing can kill me on my CNC lathe..did you try one going real slow to the extreme and see if that helps? or turn RPM down for last passes? I also have used Phils wooden helper

quote: Aren't most things about money? There is another view of all of this. If a seat is not sold and it just dies out, then it never gets upgraded ever again and that potential buying party may buy a different brand . I would talk to my reseller if I could find a buyer and see what they say at the time.

quote: That's an interesting question. Technically, software should have no impact on the value of a company... I wonder what a accountant woul say? It would be part of the "Blue Sky" when selling your business. If the business is profitable you can probably sell some Blue Sky, but right now you may have to carry most of the loan for your buyer..terrible time to sell a business... I sold one shop and got every cent we had ever spent on the shop over a 5 yr. period in terms of machines which had been new when purchased (plus even more on top)...now I would hate to think what would happen with my present shop...work till I die maybe, but I love my shop so I don't worry about it too much

quote: The companies that are looking that I know of are looking ONLY for top notch folks. and they prefer "already cross trained" as well, much easier to keep them busy.

quote: the work ehtic from were i stand in the U.S. is quanity not quality. Yup people (in general) want cheap prices first or Chinese stuff would not be taking over..Most companies want quality but so much of the time the low bidder gets the job, then the customer pours money into the tool to make it work and you tell them if you would pay more and buy a better quality tool in the first place and next time they buy a cheap tool again..aerospace and medical is probably different.