Weekly Update 05/24/2007

May 24, 2007
NEWSLETTER SPONSOR Miller

At MillerWelds.com/Results you will find information about how one company lowered its weld costs by $2,000 per day - a wheel manufacturer that eliminated weld spatter and its associated costs - a facility that was able to save $52,000 per year in maintenance costs - or a small fabrication shop that increased TIG aluminum productivity by 18%. Tooling New Products make better surface finishes while lowering machining costs Materials with unique metallurgical properties - such as titanium, tool steels, stainless steels, hardened steels and other superalloys - were developed to meet the demands of extreme applications. Along with making these materials harder, tougher, less heat sensitive and/or more resistant to corrosion and fatigue, they also became more difficult to machine. Several toolmakers have designed new insert grades, with different geometries, and others are offering solid carbide tooling designed to prolong the tooling life when machining these difficult-to-machine materials. The toolmakers say the new products help to make better surface finishes while lowering machining costs. Pneumatic Drill Advances A pneumatic drill allows a hole to be drilled automatically through material at a specific offset from a waterjet cutting head. Once the hole is drilled, the waterjet can start the cut inside the pre-drilled hole. This allows materials to be cut that may normally delaminate during the waterjet piercing process. The drill also is useful when cutting high tolerance holes in a variety of steel and stainless steel materials. By using the tool's reaming capabilities, a shop can pierce the initial hole with the waterjet and then come back and ream it to get the higher tolerances required. Selecting the best grinding wheel Selecting the best grinding wheel for an application compels a shop to match the characteristics of the wheel's basic components - its abrasive and its bonding system - with the requirements of the application. The classification of abrasives and bond materials and their basic characteristics is rather straight-forward. However, manufacturers incorporate many proprietary additives and fillers that give these materials unique characteristics that must be considered when matching application performance and finish requirements. Cylindrical grinders offer flexibility Shops that do non-round grinding have used cam-actuated grinders or a combination of surface and tool grinders in the past, and those processes have proved inflexible in production and cumbersome to set up. On the other hand, cylindrical grinders deliver flexibility in the types of grinding jobs they can handle, while maintaining the accuracy and rigidity that shops need to reduce production costs. In addition, cylindrical grinders let shops do more part operations with fewer machine setups. New end mills with progressive edge Looking for solid carbide roughing end mills to cut a wide variety of materials such as cast iron, titanium, titanium alloys, and steel materials up to 44Rc hardness? New end mills with a progressive edge profile and variable helix technology allow the tools to achieve material removal rates of five to ten times that of conventional end mills. For example, a 0.5-in. diameter tool machining P20 steel is capable of removing in excess of 20 cu in. of material per minute..

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Upcoming Webcast Series

The CNC Best Kept Secrets Series of educational webcasts from GE Fanuc and American Machinist is designed to educate manufacturers on the often overlooked ways to prevent downtime, enhance the speed of machine tools, and improve part quality.

• Best Kept Secrets to Reduce Cycle Time -- June 13, 2007 2:00 PM ET
• Best Kept Secrets to Improving Part Quality -- September 12, 2007 2:00 PM ET

Click here for more information.

Practical Machinist Metalworking Forum

Tricks of the Trade?
Feel free to share your little tricks that someone taught you or you came up with yourself. Feel free to share your little tricks that someone taught you or you came up with yourself. 20 Years old...is machining for me? First off, let me say im at one of the most confusing times in my life, probably like most people at my age, and I think my solution is being a machinist... How many toolholders is enough? What do you 'average guys' or machine shop gurus run for quantities of toolholders?

AMERICAN MACHINIST DIGITAL EDITION

Now you can get the latest edition of American Machinist delivered directly to your PC. Click here to learn more about the digital edition.

Welding Webcast Series

Four hot topics you need to hear about.

• ERP for Gases: On the Edge of Enough - July 18, 2007 @ 2:00 PM ET
• Best Practices in Electrode Selection: Maximum Profit Starts With the Process - September 25, 2007 @ 2:00 PM ET

Click here to attend these free Webcasts.

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