Like just about every other manufacturing operation, welding has made the leap into the 21st century with automation, agile manufacturing processes, and offline programming.
Before the coronavirus pandemic upended normal life and essentially shut down commercial airliners, the aviation industry had a projected need for 40,000 new aircraft—planes, helicopters, air taxis, and unmanned aerial vehicles—in the next 20 years.
Honeywell Aerospace, part of global commercial and consumer engineering conglomerate Honeywell, produces a large number of the impellers and blisks used in commercial aeroplanes.
In spite of advancing digitalization, manual workstations are still indispensable because automation is not always profitable with small batch quantities or complex processes.
Since 1996, the Plant 15 machining operations at Mercury Marine have included a reliance on automated machining cells. Over the years, the Fond du Lac, Wis.-based manufacturer and distributor of marine engines, parts, accessories and integrated systems has phased out some traditional manufacturing methods in favor of modern cells.
Since 1922, Otto Martin Maschinenbau GmbH & Co. KG has been manufacturing best-in-class woodworking machinery at its production facility in Ottobeuren, located in the idyllic alpine Allgaeu region of southern Germany.
Hockley Pattern & Tool, Halesowen, England, is an example of a company dedicated to the art and science of making perfect tooling.
Solid-carbide round tools have seemingly been around forever; before them, high-speed steel (HSS) tools ruled the roost, and after them a growing selection of alternative processes like indexables, EDM, waterjet and now additive manufacturing emerged as competition.
Today’s job shops can distinguish themselves from competitors by adding deep hole drilling/gundrilling to their offerings. But complex, custom-built machines require more floor space and a bigger investment.
Betting that the worst of the pandemic will be over and travel restrictions lifted, the 2021 edition the machine tool exhibition is putting out the welcome mat to the world.
