By Lloyd Graff Les Paul, the famed guitarist, died last Thursday at 94. He played his instrument in a jazz club until just before his death even though he had the use of only two fingers in his left hand because of arthritis. Paul’s right arm had been badly crushed in a car accident in 1948. One doctor suggested amputation, but Paul insisted that they fix it at a right angle so he could play his guitar. He developed the first solid-body, electric guitar for Gibson. The company did not see a future for the instrument until 1952, after rival…
Author: Noah Graff
Last month I wrote an article about the death of Automatic Machining, in which I ended the piece with a reference to the magazine being a CAM operated Davenport in a CNC world. Bob Brinkman, owner of Davenport, took umbrage at my comment. I am taking a moment to answer him. Bob, I love you and I love your product. My father made a lot of money running Davenports in World War II with the assistance of your father, Earl. But sadly, today, the world of machining tends to look at your and my beloved Davenport automatic as a noisy…
Mike Jackson, head of the publicly traded dealer group, AutoNation Inc., says the automotive economy has turned the corner. He sees a 13 million car year as early as 2011 or 2012. Ford is making money. GM may have an IPO as early as next year. Inventories of cars have been halved in the last few months. The green lights are illuminating the highways. Yet business in my world, the machining world, still stinks. What do you do if you are making decisions now that could affect your business for the next three years? From experience I know that the…
There’s been a breakthrough in the production of tiny gears used in medical instruments and electronic mechanisms. July 23, the NewScientist printed an article about a new technology which enables gears and cogs to make themselves. The components are formed from discs that buckle into shape after a change in temperature, and the team behind the study says the technique can produce complicated bevels or curves that are difficult to produce with traditional methods. For a decade, engineers have been experimenting with materials that spontaneously bend into shape. A thin metal film deposited on top of a heat-expanded polymer such…
Recently Lloyd Graff interviewed Chris Kaiser, president of Big Kaiser Precision Tooling Inc. They discussed Big Kaiser’s hiring philosophy and also talked about the features of two of the company’s products: the Chip-fan and the Fullcut Mill. Question: Would you be willing to hire an employee with impeccable talent but zero people skills?
By Lloyd Graff Ethamore Claar died at 55 near Pittsburgh. Among his possessions was a brass bell made on a National Acme screw machine at IMTS in 1971. Mr. Claar, known as Frank (the Ethamore came from his grandfather’s first name), worked his entire career as an engineer-draftsman for Kennametal, according to his niece Dorothy Miller who sold the bell to us for $15.02 on eBay.This bell, which measures 2 1/4” high, was made on an Acme in a one part cycle with an elegant improvisation that somehow stuck the clangor into the housing.I would love to hear from Acme…
In December 2004, a stage version of Mary Poppins debuted in London, based on the story’s original books from the ‘30s and the Disney film from 1964 which I and several generations of kids cherished growing up. Some might say producing a live remake of the story is just an easy unoriginal way to make a buck. I say it’s taking a great product that’s become somewhat neglected and making it appreciated again in today’s world. In a way it’s similar to taking a 1960 Acme and refitting it with the accoutrements of 2010 CNC controls. In September we are…
By Noah Graff Hey all you CNC Swiss medical component manufacturers out there. Ever wonder how companies are using your parts when they leave your floor?Recently medical device maker, Medtronic Inc., received a subpoena from federal prosecutors about a former army surgeon who is being accused by the army of falsifying data from his research on the company’s bone-growth product. Medtronic gave Dr. Timothy R. Kuklo nearly $800,000 over the past three years to conduct research on the company’s bone-growth protein called Infuse. A sinister doctor falsifying medical research for a multi-billion dollar company—haven’t I seen something like this before?…
Recently Lloyd Graff interviewed Chris Kaiser, president of Big Kaiser Precision Tooling Inc. They discussed what it takes for a niche cutting tool manufacturer to compete with large cutting tool companies such as Iscar, Kennametal and Sandvik. They also analyzed the features of one of Big Kaiser’s boring tools.
By Lloyd Graff Back in the heyday of Brown and Sharpe screw machines in the 1970s, many of the screw shops in Chicago ran parts for the pinball machine guys. The flippers and bumpers were exquisite mechanical devices full of precision components. Most of those parts are gone today as video games have come into vogue, but one manufacturer remains, Stern Pinball of Suburban Melrose Park, Illinois. There was an excellent article in Wednesday’s Chicago Tribune about the company and the owner Gary Stern. An accompanying piece on 98-year-old Steve Kordek, a hall of fame pinball designer is also well…