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Trends in Workforce Development

A new year is upon us, bringing great optimism and opportunity for the manufacturing industry. The ticking clock, however, reminds us we are closer to the end of the decade when a perfect storm of a limited employee pipeline, a retiring workforce, reshoring and the changing pace of technology is expected to place even greater labor demands on manufacturers, challenged by an already slim supply of skilled workers.

Quality Inspection and the CAD Connection

Modern manufacturing is rapidly adopting model-based definition (MBD). When employing an MBD strategy, the CAD model becomes more than the nominal to which all parts are measured and inspected against. MBD keeps the all-important digital thread intact—from design to manufacturing to inspection and quality reporting.

3D Printing Delivers New, Easy-to-Use Washout Tooling for Composites

With today’s focus on lightweighting, hollow parts made from composite materials, such as ducting, fuel tanks, mandrels, and rocket shrouds, are in higher demand than ever before. The composite ducting market in the aerospace and defense sector alone is expected to reach $864.7 million by 2024, according to a recent report from Stratview Research.

Heading to Mars? Pack a 3D Printer!

If NASA’s Journey to Mars project succeeds, the astronauts who make the 140 million-mile (225 million-km) trip to the Red Planet in the 2030s will need someplace to stay. The space agency is looking at 3D printing, using on-site materials, to manufacture humanity’s first deep space home.

Industry 4.0 is Big and Confusing, So Start Small

Back in the early days of the Internet, when new sites were popping up selling everything from office supplies to dog food, I told a friend that I would never shop on the Internet. Too sketchy and unsafe. Well, some of it is still sketchy and unsafe, but I shop online—like billions of other people.

The Quest for Safer 3D Printing Materials

When Desktop Metal introduced its “office-friendly” Studio metal prototype printer earlier this year, the company renewed attention on the issue of safer materials for binder jetting, an additive manufacturing method.

Busting the Myths about Artificial Intelligence

Manufacturers face a difficult task juggling the current “innovation agenda.” Today, the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), robotic automation and artificial intelligence (AI) are all poised to be the next big thing.

Walking the Talk at IMTS 2018

I just returned from IMTS in Chicago and my first thought was, “where will I be able to rack up all those bonus steps I got last week?” On the easiest day, I walked 7.9 miles, and I topped 10 miles on two other days. It’s easy to understand why.

Metrology, Product Design and the Next Revolution

When I graduated with an engineering degree some decades ago, I learned that the organizations I was going to work for had internal communication problems. This was especially true for those that designed and manufactured complex machinery such as engines, aircraft, or automobiles.