By Lloyd Graff Toyota, the icon of lean manufacturing, now has a big fat problem that could devalue the brands which vaulted it to the top selling car company in the world. The sticky gas pedal that has prompted the recall of Toyotas and Lexus going back to 2005 has been traced back to a bad design in a component made by CTS, an Indiana auto parts supplier. Because Toyota was so committed to lean manufacturing, which translated into common components across platforms and models, the company has to callback the RAV4 SUV, Avalon, Corolla, the top of the line…
Author: Noah Graff
By Noah Graff One American is doing a full court press to balance the U.S. trade deficit with China. Stephon Marbury, one of the NBA’s all time greatest bums and wastes of talent has gone to play in China. He’s not playing for a thriving cosmopolitan city such as Beijing or Shanghai, he’s playing for the Taiyuan Shanxi Zhongyu Professional Basketball Club, one of the worst teams in the league, in the podunk, coal mining city of Taiyuan. The entire city is covered by a thin layer of coal dust, including Zhongyu’s Binhe Sports Stadium, which holds around 4,500 people.…
Jim Rowe, one of Today’s Machining World’s past “Shop Doc” columnists, recently invented two iPhone Apps to deal with everyday math problems confronting machinists, programmers and engineers. Presently at the iPhone APP store the “Machinist APPrentice 2010” is available for $2.99. It gives you 4 sections to choose from: Milling, Turning, References and Math / Conversions. “The Journeymen,” soon to be released sells for $9.99, and has a much more expanded platform with a variety of Chip Thinning Factors being calculated for Radial Width of Cut, Ballnose Depth of Cut, Torodial Depth of Cut and 45 Degree Lead Angles. Rowe…
By Lloyd Graff Food selling businesses can tell us a lot about best and worst practices in the unending search for elusive success as an entrepreneur. I spent the holidays in the Bay Area (new granddaughter) and indulged my happy obsession of searching markets for the best and freshest produce, breads and cheeses. Farmers’ Markets are reduced in midwinter, but I indulged my passion at a semi-outdoor market open seven days a week called Milk Pail Market, in Mountain View, Cal., home of Google. The store was started 36 years ago by Steve Rasmussen and his father when they bought…
By Noah Graff A recent video from the online Wall Street Journal discusses a survey ranking the “best and worst jobs” of the 2010 economy. On the list, actuary ranked as the best occupation and roustabout ranked the worst. The study, published by a site called Careercast.com, is based on five criteria: work environment, income, employment outlook, physical demands, and level of stress. Feeling good at the end of the day from helping society, and plain old fun were not criteria. So the best job is actuary—the person who interprets statistics to determine probabilities of accidents, sickness, and death, and…
By Noah Graff In order to make it professionally next year more people than ever in this world are going to have reeducate themselves, whether they’re learning CNC programming, switching professions after being laid off or starting their own businesses. Lately I’ve been learning to administer a certain magazine’s Web site and taking salsa lessons. I’ve noticed that since I’ve gotten older (I’m almost 30) I’ve been listening to my teachers better. They say kids soak up knowledge much faster than adults. That may be true, but unlike when I was a kid, today I’m more aware of the learning…
Dear Oprah, I am a fan of yours. I’ve been watching your show since before you were the Color Purple. You’ve had Nobel Prize winners, cancer doctors, dessert chefs and exercise mavens, but you’ve never had anybody remotely like me tell their story. Perhaps after you read my take you will invite me to be a guest. My name is Arby Eight. I am a National Acme screw machine and damn proud of it—for the last 51 years! My story is the story of North American industry and today I’m feeling !@$#%# unappreciated. I started my productive life in 1968…
I recently had a long conversation with Brad Ohlemacher of EMC Precision Machining, the new name and incarnation of an Acme screw machine shop in the Cleveland area, called Elyria Machine Corporation. Brad and his brother Jeff are two of the most studious and innovative job shop owners I know, constantly attending seminars, conferences and learning from proponents of the black art of plant productivity. These guys are always on a mission to make their company not just profitable but a group with an identity and team spirit. Brad and Jeff utilize Verne Harnish’s Rockefeller habit of the morning huddle…
It has been 25 years since folk singer/song writer Steve Goodman Died at 36, yet his popularity is still growing. “Go Cubs Go,” his ode to the Chicago Cubs is still sung at Wrigley Field after each Cubs victory. A 778 page biography of Goodman came out recently, and his albums and songs are popular on iTunes. He wrote a song that feels like a perfect fit for these tough business days. When I saw the latest dreary statistic on the lack of growth of industrial production on the front page of Monday’s Wall Street Journal, it confirmed Steve Goodman’s classic,…
By Lloyd Graff Greg Mullins is a “glue person.” He is one of the thousands of skilled vagabonds who hit the road every day so the modern world holds together. Greg’s specialty is 10- to 20-year-old semiconductor-making machinery, particularly equipment made by GCA Corporation, which is out of business now. It is still found in a lot of defense industry plants and military bases. Greg is well paid. His services sell for $275 per hour, plus travel. He also earns a healthy per diem, which eases the pain of constant travel. He has been in the field since 1980 and…