September 1999 Issue
September 1999
Features
Featured articles from the latest issue of Modern Machine Shop
A Shop's View Of Vertical Turning
Every metalworking application is different. The challenge for shops is matching the appropriate level of technology to the job at hand. Here's how one job shop uses its vertical turning machines to produce large, heavy and tough workpieces for gas turbine engine applications.
Read MoreThis Job Shop Found Success with Swiss-Type Turning
This northern Ohio job shop is very good at making parts on Swiss-type machines. It's evolved the business from manual engine lathes to lights-out manufacturing. Success didn't come easily, but it has indeed come to this shop.
Read MoreFine Wire Is Just Fine
As parts get smaller and smaller, using EDM wire as small as 0.001 inch in diameter to cut these workpieces becomes an attractive option—actually, the only option.
Read MoreScanning CMM Technology Made More Affordable
While scanning CMMs have been around awhile, they haven't become a mainstay of general production mainly due to cost. There's little question as to the value that scanning can provide. Conventional CMM workpiece measuring processes are limited by the number of points that can be collected and analyzed in a reasonably time-efficient manner. Thus, point-by-point inspection in essence provides a spot check confirmation of certain workpiece features, but it can easily miss a variety of nonconforming geometry in between those checkpoints.
Read MoreBanking On A Swiss-Type
To shops used to conventional turning, the CNC Swiss-type is a strange sort of lathe. But for the right jobs, the machine is worth both the price and the learning curve.
Read MoreDelcam's Transition Reflects Trends in Tool Making
Mold and die makers familiar with Delcam, the UK-based software company probably associate that company with Duct, the CAD/CAM system for complex 3D forms. Users of Duct form an elite but loyal group. The system is difficult to master, but most who have mastered it consider it a powerful tool for die and mold production.
Read MoreNew Seal Design Protects Machine Tools Spindles
Effectively protecting machine tool spindles--which means primarily the spindle bearings that support the shaft--from contamination by coolant, moisture and chips has challenged some of the best and brightest engineering minds.
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