I had a long talk today with Miles Free of the Precision Machined Products Association (PMPA). Miles has heavy experience in understanding the technical problems machining companies have in the hostile world of perfect competition which relentlessly drives prices down for even the most proficient contract shops. Quality and delivery are just the price of admission to the poker game of job shop survival. In Miles’ view, the blood sport of contract machining makes the participants risk averse to a fault in venturing out of their area of expertise—making parts. The bidding process they live in everyday is unforgiving of even the…
Author: Lloyd Graff
Productivity in manufacturing rose an unprecedented 13. 5 percent in the third quarter. It means business is rising but the number of employees isn’t. The inflation vigilantes do not accept these numbers. But I’m feeling groovy about productivity gains which will give a big chill to the dollar killers and gold hoarders. Sell your bullion unless you’re going to make soup. ************** After discussing murder in the workplace, Tuesday, how about some good news? Chrysler is breaking even now despite its third grade styling. Costs have been pared to the femur. Fiat’sMarchionne is a serious guy and he has brought in…
I talked to Jim Kucharski, National Sales Manager, of Maier USA, about the health of the company. Maier has made inroads as a new player in the North American CNC Swiss marketplace. It is now pushing in the medical and department of defense markets like the other contenders. With the total Swiss market around 50 percent of last year, everybody is scrapping hard for business. Maier is a family business according to Kucharski, and son Michael recently bought the company out of reorganization in Germany to take out his father’s interest in the business. The senior Maier is a cancer survivor, but has suffered…
Interesting news about the world of heavy trucks. The domestic hauling companies are still flat on their tuchuses, but the suppliers are getting busy. The military demand is getting crazy for trucks and components and some of the big contracts are soon to come. Afghanistan is going to require a different group of vehicles than Iraq. Another leg of demand is China. The Chinese have lots of dollars and a need to move goods around their vast countryside. Evidently they are shopping here for the best and most durable vehicles. The other leg of the stool is the heavy truck…
The Inflation is coming! The inflation is coming! The inflation is coming! It’s all over the news and the bond speculators are fanning the inflation hype like Billy Mays wannabees. I have to ask the dumb question: What planet are they living on? In my world, Wal-Mart and Amazon are in a price war on books with best sellers going for $10 per copy. Home prices continue to fall as properties fester on the market. U.S. unemployment figures stick around 10 percent, but smart guys like Dan DiMicco, head of Nucor, says if you include discouraged workers who don’t show up on the…
The machine tool builders and distributors are hurting, but there is some business out there. In September the U.S. Army Rock Island, Ill. Arsenal made a major buy. They bought 15 Haas machines, two sophisticated super-high precision Hardinge lathes, six citizen Swiss CNC lathes and about a dozen assorted machining centers made by Mazak. The preference for American-built machinery strikes me as quite rational. For CNC Swiss there is no American alternative. The Mazak buy can be justified by the Japanese firm’s manufacturing presence in Florence, Kentucky. Military spending for equipment and ammunition is a significant boost for the well-pounded…
Chad Arthur stood in his former office at Arthur Machinery Tuesday with his wife as the auction of the bankrupt machine tool distribution firm he had built into a $80 million dynamo droned on. Haas, Doosan and Star lathes and machining centers, which had been his premier lines, were selling to the highest bidder. Bob Arthur, who had started the business with the Miyano line after leaving Behr Machinery in Rockford, Ill., two decades ago, was attending the sale but keeping his distance from his son. The big ARTHUR MACHINERY sign lay upside down in front of the building entrance. A…
Bob Atherton of RACO Industrial Corporation recently passed away at 82. In the rough world of used machinery dealers Bob always stood out as a gentle but indefatigable player. His company continues under the leadership of Jack Boescher who worked with Bob for many years before buying into the firm. **************** We hear that exhibitors are dropping like fall leaves from the upcoming EMO Milano show in Milan, Italy. EMO has always been a magnificent opportunity to display wares and meet and greet, but this year it is more a conclave of woe. Hard to imagine, but the European market may be more horrible than…
By Lloyd Graff Today is a day I’ve pointed toward and dreaded. It’s a day I’ll be relieved to look back upon. Today is the one-year anniversary of my heart attack that almost killed me. If you’ve read my stuff in Today’s Machining World you know my story. Feeling really crappy after a two-week vacation of feeling crappy, my wife Risa drove me 50 miles to see my doctor in Evanston, Ill. He looked at me, listened to my heart, and said, “Lloyd, you are in heart failure and I’m wheeling you to the emergency room right now.” A stent,…
By Lloyd Graff Two icons of American mechanical ingenuity I encounter every day are my Bridgeport Mill and KitchenAid mixer. It struck me that their fortunes are going in different directions. This last weekend, just a few days after the announcement arrived that Hardinge Corporation, which owns Bridgeport, is cutting back production at its flagship Elmira, New York, plant, the new movie about chef, Julia Child, Julie and Julia, made its debut. Julia Child loved her cobalt blue KitchenAid, and it now resides at the Smithsonian museum in Washington. More than any other personality, her warmth and unflappable style popularized…