Column
Filter by Process Zone:
Fabricating and Repairing 4130 and 4140 Steels in Heavy Equipment Welding
The strength of these steels is great for parts that require high strength and durability, but their higher carbon, chromium and molybdenum levels also make them more susceptible to cracking. Here are some insights into welding these steels during new fabrication and in repair, and how the right filler metal can help ensure success.
Keeping it Cool: Why Machines Depend on Chillers, and Chillers Depend on You
Lax water maintenance has a huge potential downside in laser cutting machines: bad water could lead to extreme overheating and complete failure of the laser. Here are some other reasons why keeping cool and remembering to change the chiller water will get the most work out of your machinery at the lowest cost of ownership.
Connective Forms Make Fastening Faster
Incorporating connective forms into your existing fabrication assembly process adds functionality to sheet metal components in the place of conventional fastening methods. Available for most styles of punch press, connective forming tools remove secondary welding, fasting and clipping operations to reduce assembly time and produce valuable cost savings.
How Proprietary Grains Optimize Non-Woven Abrasives for Superb Finishes
Take a closer look at how a Midwest appliance manufacturer used non-woven agglomerated grain technology to put a structured cosmetic finish on a ring for a high-end kitchen appliance, remove the medium-sized burrs left on the ring from stamping, and increase their productivity by 5X!
Building a Robotic Workcell Champion
How do the most productive and efficient shops achieve faster ROI and rationalize more cell purchases? Many have a trained champion who garners support from other team members to meet deadlines and becomes accountable for the new or existing robotic workcell.
How to Prevent Five Common Failures in Robotic Welding Systems
Are burnbacks, premature contact tip wear, loss of tool center point (TCP) or other problems costing your robotic welding operation time and money? Here are some tips that will improve productivity, reduce consumable costs and ensure consistent part quality in your robotic weld cell.
How to Avoid Losing Customers to Competitors
What’s the best strategy for keeping encroaching competitors away from your customers?
Critical Thinking: How to Make Chip Removal More Efficient, Effective and Profitable
Not all conveying systems are suited for every scrap-handling application. By using the proper conveyor to quickly transfer scrap and coolant from the machine tool for separation and processing, high volume machine shops can increase part production with less downtime between jobs, create more value for their scrap, and improve revenue by recycling coolant.
How to Increase Productivity with Self-Shielded Flux-Cored Wire
What if you could obtain high quality welds outdoors without the productivity slowdowns associated with changing stick electrodes? Self-shielded flux-cored wires allow welders to continue working without interruption. These wires have changed and improved from what was available several years ago, but you must understand how to select the best wire for the job.
Built to Last: Sheet Metal Design with Strength in Mind
Sheet metal has a high strength-to-weight ratio and good malleability that can provide form and structure to products, but because it is flat and bends easily, it doesn’t always work. Here are some ways to increase the structural strength of flat sheet stock without adding gussets or increasing the weight of the product.
Is the Vise Dead?
Even though it has been around forever, does the vise have limitations for shops in a competitive marketplace? Do you need to reinvent the wheel to reduce some of its limitations? To evaluate the vise’s viability in today’s manufacturing operations, we need to uncover the most efficient way to apply it.
An Overlooked Way to Keep Up with Industry Change
Press operation requirements, inspection needs, improved die technology, tool room utilization and lean initiatives are all transforming the way shops compete. But what if you can’t keep the die in the press because of cheap tooling?
Industry News
