Scroll down to listen to the podcast with Armand Barnils. In today’s podcast we interviewed Armand Barnils, plant manager of the U.S. division of Ventura Precision Components, a multinational precision machining company headquartered in Barcelona, Spain. Armand grew up on the outskirts of Barcelona and studied Industrial Engineering in Spain. Through a foreign exchange program he came to the United States and earned a Masters Degree in Industrial Technology and Operations at the Illinois Institute of Technology. At age 23 he moved to Pasadena, Texas, just outside of Houston, to work at Ventura Precision Components. Two years later his boss left,…
Author: Noah Graff
Scroll down to listen to the podcast with Bill Cox. In today’s podcast we interviewed Bill Cox, owner of Cox Manufacturing in San Antonio, Texas, a job shop that makes parts for a variety of industries—oil and energy, medical, and defense to name a few. Bill’s father started the company in 1956 but died when Bill was age 12. The evening of his father’s funeral a customer had the audacity to ask Bill’s mother if he could buy the company. She asked Bill that night if he was interested in going into the family business and Bill said he was.…
Scroll down to listen to the podcast with George Breiwa. About two months ago I got a call from a company asking for a price on a Traub TNL18 on our Graff-Pinkert Website. For those unfamiliar, Traub makes arguably the heaviest, most expensive and advanced CNC Swiss machines on the market—the “the Hummer of CNC Swiss” one could say. I asked the caller what his application was, thinking it was a medical part to justify such an expensive machine, but the caller told me it was for making a unique vaporizer that had no moving parts and no battery. George…
Scroll down to listen to the podcast with Scott Livingston. Scott Livingston’s Grandfather Horst, after whom Horst Engineering Company in Connecticut was named, often talked about bicycles with Scott during his childhood. Cycling was part of Horst’s life in Germany before he fled from the Nazis in 1938 and came to America. Horst started his machining company in 1946, and Scott and his family run it today. While the core business is now aerospace products made on Swiss screw machines and thread-rolled parts, a growing piece of the business is a niche product for bikers, toe spikes. Scott and the…
Scroll down to listen to the podcast with Logan McGhan. In today’s podcast we interviewed Logan McGhan, a used machine tool dealer at the firm KD Capital. Logan’s journey to selling used equipment spanned numerous stages. At around age 7, his father, who also worked in machining, brought home a complex part from a trade show that had been made on a CNC, and Logan knew that the machining industry was his calling. At 17 he built an entire rifle (aside from the scope) using manual equipment. In his 20s he and his brother started a machining business making after-market…
Scroll down to listen to the podcast with Mike Fair. At the 2018 International Machine Tool Show I recorded a podcast with Mike Fair, Product Manager of Rethink Robotics, a robotics company specializing in collaborative robots for use on the factory floor. What sets Rethink Robots apart from several of the other collaborative robot companies I saw at IMTS is that their robot models have people’s names and they feature a display tablet placed in a position to resemble a head. The robot featured at the Rethink Robotics booth was called Sawyer. Rethink’s philosophy is to give collaborative robots, also…
Scroll down to listen to the podcast with John Griner. In today’s Podcast we interviewed John Griner, founder of Griner Engineering in Bloomington, Indiana. John has been cranking out turned parts for the last 40 years, and since the ‘90s his bread and butter has been the legacy Hydromat business. He’s a renaissance man. He studies philosophy, flies planes and has played the guitar for 50 years. He has had 34 different startup businesses as diverse as centerless bar stock grinding, cold forming, video production, and an exotic animal business called “wild things.” But in the end, the one that…
Scroll down to listen to the podcast with Jeff Reinke. In today’s podcast we interviewed Jeff Reinke, Editorial Director of Industrial Equipment News (IEN). He gave his take on several of the fastest emerging trends in the machining business, including electric cars and 3-D printing. Reinke said that right now Elon Musk is suffering the consequences of overpromising and underdelivering on his products. He said that Musk is a unique car company CEO because when certain projects suffer setbacks he stubbornly charges forward instead of shelving them as other car companies would. This boldness enables Tesla to develop innovative technology…
Scroll down to listen to the podcast with Dr. Martin Levine. In today’s podcast we interview Dr. Martin Levine D.O. Martin is a third generation Osteopathic physician who worked in a family practice for 30 years, treated Olympic athletes and gave Mike Tyson a pre-fight physical—twice. He also happens to be my first cousin once removed (that means he’s my mom’s first cousin). Osteopathic Medicine uses a hands-on, holistic approach to diagnose and treat patients. The philosophy is to treat the body as a whole rather than just focusing on isolated bodily issues. In the podcast Martin explained how our…
Scroll down to listen to the podcast interview with Robert Levy. In today’s podcast we interviewed Robert Levy, longtime industrial auctioneer and owner of Robert Levy Associates, a firm that consults with companies looking to monetize their industrial assets. Robert joined his family auction business, Norman Levy Associates, in 1980 but only had the opportunity to work with his father for three years. He and his brother continued to grow the company until finally selling it to DoveBid (now GoIndustry DoveBid) in 2000 for $30 million. He stayed on the board of directors at DoveBid but then parted ways four years…