Tariff-related uncertainty was felt across manufacturing in April and metalworking was no exception. The Metalworking Index dropped to a reading of 46 in the latest GBI survey results after just one month in expansion territory, snapping a six-month streak of improving results. New orders took the hardest hit with a nearly 12-point fall from March, although the three-month average at stayed just above 50. Supplier deliveries and employment were bright spots with some positive movement.

The GBI Components Scorecard reports the monthly change rate of primary metalworking market factors contributing to the overall monthly index reading.

Reading the Scorecard: 

• Color indicates where a component value falls relative to 50 for the current month. Green indicates expansion, and red indicates contraction.
• Shade indicates a value’s distance from 50. The darker the shade, the further from 50.
• Direction indicates a value’s change versus the previous period. Pointing up is always better.

The GBI Future Business Index is an indicator of the future state of the metalworking market from industry respondents regarding their opinion of future business conditions for the next 12 months. Over 50 is expansion and under 50 is contraction.

The Future Business Index reflected a change in market sentiment. While still positive overall, the three-month average now sits at 61.2.

Find the latest metalworking market research and reporting at .

Taking Machine Monitoring from Data to Action

Source: MachineMetrics

What will define the next stage of machine monitoring software? MachineMetrics’ Rutherford Wilson believes the answer will look something like a manufacturing execution system. 

Source: Hastreiter Industries

Here are three examples of machine shops using manufacturing software and data-driven improvement concepts to bolster not only their shopfloor employees’ efficiency, but their overall productivity, too.

Four Questions (& Answers) About Data-Driven Process Improvement at CNC Job Shops

Source: GettyImages

How can shops can make informed decisions using data-driven feedback to improve shopfloor efficiency and profitability? And how will these technologies differ between high- and low-volume production?

Source: Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence

The manufacturing world will achieve gains in part-programming productivity and flexibility with the rise of machine-aware, smart digital twins powered by artificial intelligence.  

5 Stages of a Closed-Loop CNC Machining Cell

Source: Renishaw

Controlling variability in a closed-loop manufacturing process requires inspection data collected before, during and immediately after machining — and a means to act on that data in real time. Here’s one system that accomplishes this. 

Source: PMPA

Automation is thought to be the secret to improving quality in manufacturing. What if we told you it was something else?

Leveraging Data to Drive Manufacturing Innovation

Source: GettyImages

Global manufacturer Fictiv is rapidly expanding its use of data and artificial intelligence to help manufacturers wade through process variables and production strategies. With the release of a new AI platform for material selection, Fictive CEO Dave Evans talks about how the company is leveraging data to unlock creative problem solving for manufacturers.

Source: ECI Software Solutions

With the right tools, including ERP software, overcoming this “manufacturing trifecta” of challenges is within reach.

Precision Shop Adopts Machine Monitoring, Boosts Revenue

Source: LeClaire Manufacturing

Find out how adopting machine monitoring helped LeClaire Manufacturing boost its vertical CNC utilization rates 38 percentage points and gain millions in revenue.

Source: Getty Images

Adopting lights-out machining involves considerations when a machine shop decides to move forward with the process. Here are some tips to a successful implementation.

Want more data-driven content? Check out our May issue!

For large parts or for noncritical applications, measuring the radius on a part is one of those checks that can be done in one of two ways — one that “looks good enough for me” to one that can be measured to microns. Most think of a radius as the conjunction of two surfaces meeting 90 degrees to one another. On larger parts, a depth gage with a 90-degree fixture can make the qualification. A more subjective check will be a set of radius gages and a skilled operator trying to determine the best match.

However, with today’s more complicated and very high-precision parts, workpiece radii can have a variety of shapes and contours. Measuring them is part of daily business in production, and many highly sophisticated tools considerably simplify the measurement of complicated workpieces. A specialized measuring method is required to calculate radii with tangentially connected contour geometries and the transition points of the neighboring contour elements.

On most complicated parts, the transition to the radius is not 90 degrees, so one must be able to measure the lines on the front and back sides of the radius to begin the process. These measurements are ideal for contour systems that can run a trace from the starting line, through the radius and then over the exiting line. A contour system is a growing extension of surface roughness machines, but with more range to perform these profile measurements. However, there are other times when the part lends itself to the application of using vision, such as in a shaft machine or measuring microscope, where the same techniques can be used to precisely calculate the radius.

All these systems calculate the tangential circle that transitions into two straight lines. With the measuring system, once the trace is made, the operator can view the profile of the part. Most contour and vision systems can do all types of calculations based on data from the profile in front of them. In this case, the operator would select the two regression lines leading to the radius. A common method used with these lines is calculating the angle between the two selected lines. However, in this case, the system will have a choice to calculate the “tangential circle to the straight lines.”

Based on the intersection of the two straight lines, a tangential circle is created and, if needed, the circle can be displayed as a full circle. It is also possible to filter the profile in the area of the circular arc in order to eliminate roughness components. The tangential circle is fitted in such a way that the sum of the distance squares of the measured profile points in the selected circle segment is minimal, taking into account the transition points of the tangential straight lines. With the circle in place, the measuring system can precisely calculate the radius of the two intersecting lines. Even for contour profiles with high roughness and small circle segments, the tangential functions work reliably and robustly so that the repeatability of the results is extremely high.

Many systems will also be able to calculate the tangential circle with only one straight line — in this case, the tangential point between the circle and the straight line is formed on one side. With this method, the operator would select the leading line coming into the radius and then limit the circle and the remaining profile. The circle and radius are still available for reporting.

There probably is no better or higher-precision way to make these types of radii or transition checks than with a profiling contour system or vision system designed for this purpose. The ability to use the collected data points and analyze them easily makes the check much more straightforward for the operator and requires no guesswork.

The shop now sports an expanded range of capabilities while proving much more efficient. Some processes can be days shorter, while jobs requiring complex programming can be months shorter.

In this shop tour, we’ll see and hear about some of the tools Goode has used to overhaul MSP's processes and explore some of the departments that Goode has relied on to consolidate processes and improve the shop’s efficiency.

Transcript:

Evan Doran (Senior Associate Editor, ¸ßÅâÂÊÁùºÏ²Ê): Hi, I'm Evan Doran with ¸ßÅâÂÊÁùºÏ²Ê. We're here today at MSP Manufacturing, an aviation and defense focused job shop in Bloomington, Indiana.

Johnny Goode (President, MSP Manufacturing): The company was founded in 1943. It started making tachometers for planes for World War II. I came in and started working part-time because I was still working full-time as a narcotics detective. I had a job offer from the FBI to be a special agent from them. But after working here and kind of seeing the culture and the mission set here, I kind of fell in love with it.

Evan: Over the past few years, MSP has grown considerably due to its new president's focus on grants, new software—

Johnny: CAM Assist, ProShop and some of the other processes we've implemented. It makes our flow so much smoother.

Evan: —And an open shop culture. Join us on this episode of View from My Shop as we take to MSP’s shop floor and learn more.

Johnny: Then this is our machine shop. What's cool is everything on this side of the line, and also this , are all new to us since 2022. Prior to 2022, we had, no five-access capabilities, we had a really old water jet. So, we did a bunch of capital purchases in 2022. So, we bought our Haas UMC 750, we also bought this, UMC 500 with pallet pool, which was helped by the state of Indiana with the Manufacturing Readiness Grant. They paid for half of the machine, and then we upgraded our waterjet to be able to, just do things a little bit more accurately. And we had one that had, doubled the footprint and we just only used a small section. We consolidated to a smaller one, and then, we won a large contract with BAE, doing parts for them. So we invested in, a Nakamura lathe with a Patriot Edge bar feeder. So we consolidated what was taking two ops on a lathe, sometimes two to four ops on a mill, and now they're doing it in one op. So it's coming out and it's also automated, so it's running lights out.

I had a close friend who, was on SWAT with me that started his own company and was looking for a manufacturer. So we started manufacturing for him. Some defense companies we reached out, were like, hey, we'll do whatever work you guys need done. So that's when I, we got into kind of that woodworking stuff. And then we just, I rebranded the company from MSP Aviation to MSP Manufacturing.

And then what's cool is every single one of our mills is fourth-axis capable. So, we have a rotary for every single one of our mills. And then we, have some 5th Axis work holdings on them. Like the company 5th Axis. Our long-term strategy is to try to outfit every machine with the same workholdings so that if we need to move jaws or parts to other machines that's using the same base plates. And the goal is to also have our ¸ßÅâÂÊÁùºÏ²Ê also have the 5th Axis rock plate as well so that when we're measuring parts, we won't even have to take them out of the jaws or the workholdings. So that if there is a mistake, they're able to put it back on the machine within two tenths and make the fix if it's possible. if not, you might have to add another piece of raw material to it.

So a lot of these older Hurcos that we have do a really good job on our core product, which are, you know, things that are generally found in the cockpit of almost every commercial airline. So some of our core products include instrument cases and the case assembly. So, a case, bezel and glass and, they're usually painted and depends on solder or epoxy, but the bezels are fixated to the glass and then attach to the case, and that's what actually holds the instrument. So that glass part of that case assembly is what you'll see on, the user side of the cockpit. And then we make clamps that hold, the case to the back of the cockpit, avionics cooling ducts that sit in between the pilot and copilot that cool the instruments, and then, some switch guards that cover some critical switches you don't want to accidentally press. And that as well as a handful of other kind of random parts that different OEM put inside the cockpit.

I thought this would be a lot better at creating a future for my children as well as [a chance to] live a somewhat more normal lifestyle, but from there, I—my dad promoted me to the vice president in November, and that's when I really started working full time. I worked about two years as a vice president. And then I learned, you know, did a lot of our accounting and financial, and I started learning a lot more about the operations side and as well as kind of the HR side.

So before we got the Nakamura, we had just like 12-foot bars of quarter-inch material. So we made this and we ran with that for like eight months before we were able to get the Nakamura in here. And I mean, we stayed ahead of their production schedule with it and wasn't lights out, but it had longer run time so that he could we had one operator pretty much managing all the lathes.

Evan: I guess kind of with that, do you all just run one shift?

Johnny: Yeah, generally we run one shift Monday through Thursday, but we do have a skeleton shift of, like, two younger kids that just prefer not to wake up or as early. So we run 6 to 4:30 on the first shift and then 2 to 12:30 on that second shift. And, generally those two individuals are able to keep, you know, half of the machines, if not all the machines running. So we get really good efficiency out of the out of just those two.

Evan: So how much space do you have, like, square footage-wise for the shop?

Johnny: All of MSP occupies about 25,000 square feet. So I would say maybe 9,000 square feet is the machine shop.

Then we use ProShop as our ERP. We started implementing that in 2022 as well. And that's been really helpful for just visibility from everyone's perspective. But I think without that, we wouldn't be able to get ahead kind of how we are now. So that was also a big piece of the equation.

Evan: Sure. Can you go into that a little more? Like, what all this brought to the table?

Johnny: Yeah. So prior to that, our old ERP system really had a bunch of modules that didn't talk to each other. And it was really hard to see things at like a 30,000 [foot] view. So, like what is my total month's work? What do I have? And hours needed to complete job? And it was just like, purchasing wasn't really talking to the work order. So, it was very hard to be efficient on how you're ordering things, how you're scheduling things. This whiteboard behind you was kind of how they schedule day prior to our ERP system.

So with ProShop, we're able to pretty much see everything from the estimate to the invoice, and everybody can click on it and it's all, all has links built in. So like if you're on a part and you want to — or a work order and you want to see more information on the part, you just click the part and it takes you to the part level so you can see the history of rev changes, how many time it's been made, and everything's importable and exportable as well.

So, I can do a lot of analysis through Excel, Microsoft Power BI, and a lot of things in real time where I just wasn't able to do that. And then we're also able to say, like with our core product, we generally have like a two-year forecast. So if another company orders that same part, we're able to see, as soon as that part's taken out of inventory, it's like, okay, now we're going to be short in October of next year by this part, So let's build another work order to fund that. And it does that automatically. So we're that's I think a big part of why we're able to stay ahead, is that — at midnight the system is always cross-referencing what you have in work orders, orders and inventory and notifying you when you're deficient.

This is our tumbling room and deburring. But it also has a few different ovens in there because we do some of our own heat treating in-house.

So, one of these parts, they start out as a round tube and they heat it up and then bring it to size. And then they have on their work orders what numbers coordinate to what part.

And any time that we're able to, I always try to put like the, either the what, like for aerospace, the aircraft that it's going to or especially if it is mission critical on the work order. So like we had an example where a Chinook needed parts like yesterday. And I put that on the work order “as soon as possible, it's for, Chinook,” and like it flowed through here so fast because the guys were all like, “let's get this to the warfighter.” And then, this is all the filtration that we need to do just for the waterjet.

So although, like the main part of this department is kind of that secondary ops or finishing up the machine, this is also where a lot of the jobs will start. So they'll get, you know, saw cut if we don't have the material already ordered to cut. And then we have a few punch presses back here where it will, bend or form some of our bands that go to the avionics clamps that we manufacture. And then we have a couple other jet saws back here and an additional Bridgeport.

And so this is our assembly department, and I think this is kind of what separates us additionally from other machine shops. The previous one being that we have our own core product. So we have parts where we're approved by the FAA as the sole person approved by the FAA to manufacture those parts. We also have a complex assembly department that, does an excellent job of assembling parts that — generally people that are very good machinist aren't sometimes the people you want assembling things that are very precise and tedious. So yeah, we have a great team back here that is about half of our direct labor split between our machine shop and assembly.

This is an example of one of our clamps. So that's what it goes to the back of the cockpit. And what Jeri is doing is she's part marking it. So we have two Keyence inkjet printers and then an  inkjet printer.The reason for the two is that, the Boeing spec and what other likes the ink that is almost proprietary to Imaje.

And then we use, we kind of have our own workforce development program. So we start recruiting sophomores in high school that go through, like, a two-year apprenticeship program here. And then, if we're hiring at the time, sometimes we’ll fund their education and then they come back here and work after they graduate from trade school.

If we go back here, this is where our case assembly is. So this is where they're either soldering or epoxying cases to the glass. A big pain point of the process is just the cleaning of the glass. But everything is very tedious. This is an example of one of the bezels that gets affixed to the case.

Today I think this is a lot lower production machine shop than what we generally have. But we don't typically have that, “everybody's stressed,” but it's just kind of like, you know, it’s what’s expected to get the stuff done and it's kind of a lot less stressful than it used to be. So that's one nice part about, CAM Assist, ProShop and some of the other like processes we've implemented. It just — it makes our flow so much smoother.

I'm not saying that on-time delivery is not crucial, but I was like, the last thing I want to do is rush a part to get it to the customer on time and have it be bad. I think if a customer is willing one way, it's like, “make sure it's a high-quality part.” Now we try to do it both or it's high-quality part on time, if not early and with great customer service. And I think if you can do those three things, you don't really even need to invest in marketing because your customers will just come back with more.

And then back in here too, we have a big kind of paint booth. We sold it off about four years ago, but we used to have a construction and manufacturing equipment company, so they made, like, big roadside ditchers and whatnot. So we made a paint booth for that. I think you can fit a car in there if you really wanted to.

But so many of our our parts require paint now, and that's almost become our biggest backlog is, you know, a lot of these Boeing spec paints and all of our case assemblies get painted. A lot of our defense parts are now getting painted.

So that's where we tried to market. It's like, we can provide, paint, second-ops.

We can supply chemical finishing through our supply chain, and then paint at the end of it and/or assembly. So we've tried to market like instead of managing five vendors, now you only have to manage one. And that's where we've seen a lot of growth in our defense company is like, oh, I just have to cut one PO and just keep asking those guys where it's at, instead of following every part of the supply chain.

So this is our, quality department. That's where we receive in, our material. We do our first-piece inspections, as well as incoming and outgoing inspections for outside processing. But it's kind of central to our company because, all parts run in and out of here so frequently.

So we have, four individuals that support our quality department. And then, we're looking at it adding additional equipment that will be here in the first quarter to scale up our quality department to match the capabilities that our machine shop currently has.

Evan: Sure. So what are some of the kinds of equipment that you’ve got here?

Johnny: So we have, we have a Faro Arm, which Luke is currently using to measure that larger part there. We also have a Keyence image scanner as well. And then we have a comparator and then, a manual ¸ßÅâÂÊÁùºÏ²Ê that's back in that room. And then we're looking at adding a Hexagon ¸ßÅâÂÊÁùºÏ²Ê here in the first quarter as well.

Yeah, this is probably our most precise, but it's also a super small footprint.

And, it works better with things that are shorter Z-height. So, we do a lot of these bands for our clamps that are almost two-dimensional parts, and you have a small Z-height, but, we do thousands of them, so it's nice to bring them in here, you know, every couple hundred to just make sure that we're not floating one way or another with the tolerances.

Evan: Are there any particular jobs, even vaguely speaking, that would do require the, the expansion to the quality department?

Johnny: I think it's more of tackling a volume problem than the measuring. Now, a lot of our work isn't even to the tenths usually. It's like one thou, half a thou, so we haven't ever had to measure those. But my thought is like, once you have it, then you can open up the ability to, to quote and then maybe machine it.

Evan: So having that kind of extreme ability to do that.

Johnny: Yeah. So it's kind of we've upped our capabilities in the machine shop and we haven't really done an equal part in quality. So kind of bring quality up. And then after I do that I can increase the capabilities of the machine shop. And I keep like going back and forth.

Brent Donaldson (Editor-in-Chief, ¸ßÅâÂÊÁùºÏ²Ê): Hey everybody, Brent Donaldson with ¸ßÅâÂÊÁùºÏ²Ê here. And if you just watch that video and you're thinking, “Boy, I'd like my shop to be featured in The View From My Shop series,” then just send us an email at shopvideo@mmsonline.com and tell us what sets your shop apart.

Starrett’s families of indicators share numerous design commonalities, but manufacturing the many intricate differences between them requires a diverse range of tools and efficient processes. Photos provided by ¸ßÅâÂÊÁùºÏ²Ê.

Testing a gage requires an operator to follow careful, standard procedures and use reference standards even more accurate than the gage in question. But what about manufacturing that gage?

The Athol, Massachusetts, headquarters and production facility of The L.S. Starrett Company answers this by pointing to its more than 500,000 square feet of manufacturing space. Much of it is filled with mills, lathes, Swiss-type machines and a wide host of other equipment, from inspection stations to an automated palletized Mazak cell. Just as important are the facility’s ongoing efforts to optimize its processes, leveraging lean manufacturing principles to improve its own operators’ factory floor experiences.

Athol Roots

Since its 1880 foundation in Athol, Massachussetts, Starrett has continually expanded its physical facilities alongside its product catalog. Its campus now includes several buildings on both sides of the downtown Millers River, as well as a hydroelectric dam that provides about a third of the complex’s electricity. Even after later expansions and acquisitions have led to Starrett facilities across the U.S. (as well as international manufacturing facilities in the U.K., Brazil and China), the company’s first site is still home to precision hand tool manufacturing. Tim Cucchi, the continuous improvement manager for the assembly department, says that of the company’s roughly 2,700 precision hand tools, around 88% of those are made start to finish in Athol.

Starrett has partnered with Snap-On Certification and the National Coalition of Certification Centers to develop domestic training programs in precision measurement and inspection. The current initiative makes use of a 200-tool chest covering a wide range of precision measurement tools and a corresponding course to prepare technical school instructors and new machinists alike.

The location employs about 450 people, with 250 working on the factory floor. Cucchi says tool makers go through a four-year apprenticeship in Athol, rotating between departments to learn processes and equipment while also brushing up on necessary math skills at nearby community colleges. This is in addition to “Starrett University,” a 40-hour crash course for new hires in the basics of manufacturing, shopfloor safety and company history.

The Machines Making Metrology Devices

This attention to training is vital due to the sheer variety of machines the facility uses — and the exacting tolerances of its parts.

According to Cucchi, 90% of parts at the Athol facility start on a Swiss-type screw machine. Many of these are still cam-driven, though the facility is gradually adopting newer CNC models. The factory’s production floor also makes good use of its Bridgeport machines, which Starrett has equipped with Accu-Rite DROs. These Bridgeport machines can be found on multiple floors of the Starrett facility, with the company using foot pads under each upper-floor machine to ensure stability and its own No. 199 Master Precision level to ensure everything is square to the floor.

The company also maintains a sizable grinding department with both surface grinding and centerless grinding machines for removing angles and dovetails, with the department also working to deburr parts. Other, more specialized machines are localized to production areas dedicated to producing specific metrology devices. These range from relatively common wire EDMs to punch cells, climb milling machines and others, including an ESSA press for radius gages that Cucchi heard decades ago might be one of the last two ESSA press machines in the world.

Many of these machines are manual or cam-driven, which Cucchi notes are less likely to spark interest in younger generations of prospective hires than more modern hardware. As such, the company has a three-year plan for introducing additional automation and updated machines into the factory. This plan has already resulted in a growing presence of robotic-assisted CNC throughout the factory, but Cucchi stresses that it is not a universal change. Although the company hopes to remove repetitive manual tasks in as many places as possible, Cucchi says that meeting the requirements necessary for Starrett’s finest-resolution gages (which can be accurate to within 50 millionths of an inch) still requires a high-skill human hand.

Starrett maintains a hydroelectric dam for the river next to its Athol headquarters, which supplies a third of the facility’s electricity. White lines on the pictured building show the crests of significant floods, including a major flood in 1938.

Tooling Optimization

This skill requirement is especially relevant to the Special Gage division, which is headed by Andrew Morin. This department creates custom gages for customers with difficult and unique requirements (including Starrett’s factory floor). Sometimes, the gages the department makes are the only way to obtain a particular measurement, and other times they provide a way to simplify collection of an otherwise difficult-to-obtain measurement.

This includes large calipers meant to measure parts as large as 16 feet in diameter, which Morin says are typically made from steel and require four people to operate. The Special Gage division made a carbon fiber version of the same caliper with a honeycomb construction that is far lighter and only requires two people to operate.

The division also recently tackled hot steel gaging (that is, measuring billet steel at temperatures between 1,200 and 1,500 degrees Fahrenheit), which traditionally requires operators to perform several time-consuming measurement tasks inside a hot oven. The Special Gage division’s newer electronic gage for hot steel gaging is much more efficient, Morin says, and much less dangerous for metrology personnel.

Morin says that some popular items produced by the department can shift to the main factory floor during periods of high demand, though this is uncommon. More common in recent years, however, has been shared engineering tips across teams, which Morin says reflects ongoing efforts to foster a more collaborative, more efficient factory environment at the Athol facility.

Starrett’s Tru-Stone division manufactures and supplies companies (including the Athol factory) with temperature-stable pink granite that inspection personnel can use to ensure equipment is flat, square and parallel. The division also now offers red granite among its line of surface plates.

The Metrology Psychology

The Athol facility’s shifting culture is also visible across its factory floors. Cucchi and his team have been hard at work redesigning production cells for greater efficiency and a better operator experience. Everything from layout to furniture color choices has shifted in some areas, with Cucchi saying that the newer, blue and gray areas reflect research that blue enhances viewer mood.

Indicator families, which used to be built in separate parts of the facility based on size, are now created at the same cell, concentrating tools and skills in what Cucchi says is a move toward lean manufacturing. Each area also undergoes regular Kaizen events that standardize 5S principles across the shop and optimize the condensed cells. One cell for a back plunger indicator assembly area was condensed from three sub-assembly areas to a single cell, reducing the square footage necessary for its operation by half (and thereby freeing it up for other parts). The optimization also freed up two full-time employees, who Cucchi says were then able to contribute 900 hours assembling other indicators over the three months after the Kaizen event.

In a parallel to the facility’s understanding that Bridgeport machines still have a place in high-tolerance manufacturing, the company runs its Kaizen events through handwritten notes and whiteboards rather than dedicated software. Cucchi says the idea behind this strategy is that writing things down by hand will increase the feeling of responsibility teams have toward the findings and recommendations.

The facility also maintains an Obeya room, which is a sort of command center where management uses printouts and whiteboards to visually manage quality, production, throughput and other critical business components. Supervisors and department champions meet here multiple times each week to check on the state of the factory floor and promptly apply countermeasures to any issues. A dedicated team of engineers also meets in the “Starrett Solution Center” every day for two hours to discuss ways to improve quality, throughput and cost efficiency. In addition, Starrett charges a production planning team with planning which parts are needed in what quantities and how to manage machine capacity for optimal production. As part of this, the team tracks the full kit of parts that go into any one of Starrett’s many precision hand tools.

The focus on white boards and hand-written notes does not preclude the use of electronic dashboards in select areas, and supervisors across the factory floor host daily, face-to-face, department-specific meetings. Here, they review dashboard readouts on safety, quality and delivery, as well as any other concerns factory floor staff might have.

Starrett also manufacturers the traditional, time-tested optical comparators that it uses on its factory floor to measure key features in turned, round parts. Its newer digital comparators and vision systems use high-resolution cameras and software to automatically measure distance and angle patterns for both full measurement of repeat programmed parts in the metrology lab and quick “walk-up” measurements of parts on the factory floor.

Internal Support

As mentioned about the Special Gage division and its symbiotic relationship with the main factory floor, Starrett’s individual departments are working more closely together to improve their processes.

This includes support departments such as a dedicated tool and die team that maintains punch and die sets for other departments, as well as an extensive tool room department. The toolroom department not only prepares tools but maintains them, sharpening milling cutters and reamers. It also manufactures the fixtures for gages and provides maintenance for capital equipment around the shop.

Starrett uses its own devices and technologies in the measurement and testing of several of its gages. This includes unique equipment from the Special Gage division as well as more widely offered precision gages and metrology equipment such as its automated force testing systems, multi-sensor vision systems and Starrett granite from its Tru-Stone division.

While many of Starrett’s highest-requirement processes remain manual and staffed, Starrett has been gradually automating low-skill, repetitive processes across its Athol facility. In doing so, the company can redeploy staff members to more engaging and value-added work.

The facility also houses machines to perform many of the postprocessing steps that go into its metrology devices. A large tumbling department tumbles, blends and brightens workpieces to achieve deburring and finishing specifications a wide range of parts prior to plating and assembly. Heat treatment may mostly take place in nearby partner facilities, but tempering takes place in-house (and is one of the facility’s robotically automated operations). Laser marking, chrome plating and sandblasting also take place in house, unifying many production steps under one roof and eliminating possible transportation and communication bottlenecks with outside vendors.

This unification of processes represents a boon to the business as a whole and to the employees working there. Tedious, repetitive processes have been automated or otherwise streamlined, navigating work orders is simplified, continuous improvement efforts are more robust and the company’s high-end operations and high-skill employees still work in the ways that are most suitable for them. The resulting efficiency gains have freed up Starrett employees to spend additional time and effort on its recent entries to the market: a touchscreen-based digital/dial indicator, the W4900, and Starrett’s largest AVR benchtop vision system to date, the multi-sensor AVR400. Starrett’s team aims for these newer tools and metrology systems to improve on the efficiency of inspection personnel, thus granting them some of the same benefits Starrett itself now enjoys.

Measuring History

Starrett’s Athol campus also plays host to a company museum. Here, company archivists maintain machines from the first few decades of Starrett’s history and display physical records of the company’s achievements. All the machines in the museum were used in production at the factory at some point, including old lathes, a pantograph, a hacksaw invented by founder Laroy Sunderland “L.S.” Starrett and John Boynton, a drill gage, a shaper and more. It also features L.S. Starrett’s original, personal toolbox, as well as a micrometer that Starrett Technical Support Scott Robinson says was carried with a soldier during the Battle of Iwo Jima.

Starrett takes great pride in its history as an American manufacturing company. Due to its service supplying the U.S. Armed Forces in World War II, the company was awarded an “E for Excellence Award” flag, which it flew over the Starrett headquarters before retiring it to the Starrett Museum.

The museum also features Starrett’s “E for Excellence Award” the company was awarded in 1943 for its contributions to the WWII war effort. It also houses photos of the 1928 Byrd Expedition to the South Pole, where surveyor George A. Thorne made use of Starrett equipment. Archivists also preserve the company’s oldest catalogs, enabling them to track the development of Starrett tooling from the company’s earliest years through the present.

Another class of predictive models relates the milling parameters to the cutting and noncutting times given the part geometry. These models use the peak or average cutting force, which depends on the part geometry, CNC tool path and milling parameters, to modify the cutting and noncutting times by updating the instantaneous feed rate along the tool path to maintain a constant average force. The outcome is optimized cutting and noncutting times for maximum productivity.

To date, however, these two predictive capabilities have remained separate. Machining dynamics models do not typically include the time-dependent cutting conditions imposed by CNC tool paths. They tend to focus on, for example, a fixed radial depth to determine stable combinations of spindle speed and axial depth in the graphical form of a stability map. Feedrate scheduling solutions do consider the variable cutting conditions for arbitrary three-axis and five-axis tool paths, but do not include the effects of relative vibration between the cutting tool and workpiece on the milling stability. This relative vibration occurs because the tool and workpiece are not rigid and a complete solution requires more than geometry.

To demonstrate the combination of these two predictive models, the part geometry displayed in Figure 1 was selected. It provides a continuously variable radial depth of cut with a fixed axial depth. The combination of varying radial depth with fixed axial depth mimics traditional three-axis, 2.5D CNC machining tool paths, where the material is removed with X-Y planar tool paths that implement the user-selected stepover (radial depth) and advance the stepdown in the Z direction (axial depth) between each planar tool path. The Figure 1 geometry was machined multiple times using a different axial depth to transition from stable (low axial depth) to unstable, or chatter (high axial depth), cutting conditions. The workpiece material was 6061-T6 aluminum in all cases.

For the part geometry shown in Figure 1, the variation in radial depth of cut with cutting time is displayed in the top panel of Figure 2. The constant radial depth of 3.18 mm is observed at the beginning and end of the toolpath. The radial depth increases from 3.18 mm (25% radial immersion) to 12.7 mm (slotting) at the center of the cut. The variation in angle of engagement is shown in the bottom panel of Figure 2. The angle is 60 degrees for the 25% radial immersion portion of the tool path and increases to 180 degrees for the slotting condition in the middle of the tool path.

Machining tests were performed where a 6061-T6 aluminum workpiece was bolted to a cutting force dynamometer so the in-process cutting force could be measured. The workpiece geometry was the ramp profile shown in Figure 1 with the variation in radial depth displayed in Figure 2. The axial depths were 7 mm and 12 mm. The spindle speed was 7,000 rpm and the feed per tooth was 0.05 mm. Flood coolant was applied to evacuate chips.

Results for the 7-mm axial depth are displayed in Figure 3. The black line is the predicted time-dependent cutting force, the red line is the measured time-dependent cutting force, and the blue line is the peak cutting force (assuming a rigid tool). Figure 3 shows that the force profile mimics the variation in radial depth of cut in Figure 2. The 7-mm axial depth provides stable cutting conditions.

A magnified view of the beginning of the Figure 3 cut is shown in Figure 4. Figure 4 shows that the cutting force constantly varies as the teeth enter and exit the cut and the radial depth of cut increases to the constant 3.18 mm value.

Figure 5 displays results for the second ramp case. The axial depth is now 12 mm and the cutting conditions are unstable near the middle of the tool path. It is observed that the predicted and measured cutting force grows dramatically as the radial depth approaches 12.7 mm (slotting) and chatter occurs. However, the peak force predicted by feed rate scheduling with the rigid tool assumption does not show the chatter condition.

Figure 6 displays a magnified view of the transition from stable to chatter conditions. The force increases substantially due to the self-excited vibration and poor surface finish is obtained. As noted, the peak force predicted by feed rate scheduling with the rigid tool assumption does not predict chatter.

When automation is mentioned in the context of job shops or small companies there may be a number of perceived obstacles: the technology itself can be intimidating, the assumed cost and integration required to incorporate automation into a shop’s workflow and the training needed to run the tech are just a few. And many shop owners just don’t know where to start. Consulting firm McKinsey has released a number of studies on industrial automation and found that while 94 percent said digital solutions will be an important part of their future automation efforts, 61 percent said lack of experience with automation was their primary barrier to adoption. McKinsey also found that 62 percent of respondents sought an automation provider who could offer full-service models for implementation and support. 

Enter , a machine-tool importer and engineering services provider that offers a variety of automation solutions to its customers, from simple automation like tool changers up to fully integrated robots and cobots for automated cells linking multiple machines and technologies. With more than 300 applications and machine experts and engineers at locations across North America, Methods works closely with manufacturers from presale through installation and production to ensure that its customers are taking full advantage of all the technology offers.  

Small shops, big results: breaking down automation barriers

Jon Star, director of marketing and communications at Methods Machine Tools in the Boston area, believes we are at an interesting time in manufacturing. “There are a lot of converging forces and themes and I call it with a lot of disruption in manufacturing today,” Star said. “There’s the rate of change in technology, the labor shortages and aging-out of existing manufacturing employees. And companies have higher pressure than ever to perform, particularly small, non-OEM businesses that are dealing with a higher cost of running their businesses.”

The Methods Plus-K60 Automation System is added to a medium bed FANUC RoboDrill. This system not only exchanges part carriers, but also tool holders to enhance the functionality of the RoboDrill. Source:

Star continued explaining the holistic way he looks at approaching automation. “Automation certainly isn’t new to manufacturing, but with each passing quarter, the pressure is there for business owners to ask how they can embrace it,” he said. “They ask where to start and need help looking at it from the perspective of their entire business and not just at the application level. That’s where Methods tries to deliver for our customers, helping them drive the most value in and out of their businesses and still meeting or exceeding their customers’ expectations.” 

Skylar and Nick Squillace with Bryson Pope, sales engineer from Methods Machine Tools. Source: NS Precision

Nick and Skylar Squillace were just the right business owners to embrace this way of thinking and automation in their business. Finding the right partner who provides the machines and automation solutions and can instill a level of confidence and comfort in the technology and offer ongoing training and support, is not automatic. So when the founders of decided to pursue opening a job shop, they knew finding the right supplier who was a true partner would be crucial to their success.

The brothers started their manufacturing careers during college at a small machine shop in the motorsports world. “There was a machine in the corner that no one had touched, and it still had the wrapping on it and we told our boss we needed to use that machine for the parts we were building at that time for a race car,” Skylar said. “I picked up the manual and we both started reading it and figured out how to run it from that and YouTube videos.”

Fast forward to 2019, with both brothers working on motorsports teams, when they started a small job shop in Nick’s garage. Nick went full time in 2022 while Skylar is still working in motorsports and  working part-time at the shop with his brother, with plans to eventually go full- time. Last summer, they hired their first full-time employee.

The automation imperative: meeting industry challenges head on

When they decided to pursue building a business from scratch, they knew they wanted to do it right the first time, and that meant buying the right equipment and technology that would serve them immediately and still allow them to grow their capacity down the road. Their first machine in Nick’s garage was a T14iA FANUC RoboDrill, a 3-axis vertical CNC machine that they still operate every day in their business. Nick said they wanted to embrace the latest technology.

RoboDrill being delivered to NS Precision. Source: NS Precision

“At the time, the was relatively new and there weren’t a ton of people using it yet,” Nick continued. They reached out to Methods and had a sales engineer calling on them. “We were asking about it on forums and our sales engineer was taking us to different companies that had the machines just so we could see what it did for them in their business. We decided we were probably going to buy more equipment (down the road) with automation than without, and long term knew that was how we would amplify what we got done.”

Zachary Spencer, director of engineered solutions at Methods, said he thinks of the Plus K60 systems as a pallet and tool manager for a small vertical mill. “It takes a lot of the technology from the past with horizontal machining centers, where you have big tombstones, and it shrinks it down to a smaller spindle workspace that allows for the automatic pallet loading and tool management for that type of machine instead.”

Star said the genesis of this platform was for shops running high-volume or high-mix/high-volume and offering them a platform to leverage the speed and precision of the RoboDrill with a very user-friendly interface and system for parts and tooling management, to free them up to focus on more strategic parts of their business.

Embracing technology from day one

Star describes Nick and Skylar as “automation natives.” Much like millennials are considered the first “digital natives” because they grew up immersed in the internet and connectivity that those born before them had to adapt to, the Squillaces have embraced automation from the founding of their business. 

When automation became more prevalent, shop owners and employees initially thought they may be replacing workers with robots or machines — but that has not been the case. “I’ve never been involved in a discussion where a company is trying to replace an operator with a robot, it’s always that they can’t hire enough people to do every-day tasks so they can replace the monotonous loading and unloading of parts with a robot so operators can focus on part inspection and programming the next parts that will run on the machines,” Spencer said.

We delivered this pretty massive amount of parts and the customer thought we were some machine shop with 100 people and we’re a two-man shop!

NS Precision runs lights out to serve customers. Source: NS Precision

NS Precision, located in Cornelius, North Carolina, does some higher volume production parts, but also has a lot of high-mix, lower volume parts they run for customers in the aerospace, defense and motorsports industries. “During an 8-hour workday we’re doing a lot of set up and essentially dialing in the parts. Once we get parts that pass our quality inspection we set up the automation cell, load it up and go home,” Nick said. “We can only get so much done during an 8-hour day so that was a big reason for us to go with the Plus K60. We can do the heavy lifting so to speak during the day and let the machine run at night. In the past year we’ve pretty much done that every night.” 

Nick said they average about 100 hours a week of automated production, and they’ve come up with some innovative ways to run parts sequentially.

Skylar recounted one order where the shop produced 153 unique part numbers in days, in quantities of five to 24 of each part, by running three machines around the clock. “The Methods Plus K60 probably did half of that order and the other half was split among two people operating two other machines, so you can see how much volume we are able to run through that machine during a 250-hour continuous cycle, or almost two full weeks of active machining time. We delivered this pretty massive amount of parts and the customer thought we were some machine shop with 100 people and we’re a two-man shop!” 

And NS Precision is winning jobs because of their lights-out automation. Skylar shared one example of this: “Another company is quoting six to eight weeks because they’re only quoting eight hours a day, no weekends, five days a week. We’re 16-hour days and an additional eight days a month in that same period,” due to their ability to run full production unmanned. This advantage allows them to offer customers shorter lead times and is helping them grow their business.

The right solutions for the right customers

Success isn’t guaranteed just because a shop installs some automation; it must be the right solution for the applications they are running. Spencer said they ask a lot of questions to learn the pain points customers are having and they find common questions and problems over and over that drive them to the right solution or system to recommend. 

“For NS Precision, they are changing over more frequently so a more standardized set up that allows for quick changeover time and high spindle utilization was a requirement for them,” Spencer continued. “When we work with someone like an automotive OEM customer, they need equipment that runs one, two, or three million of the same part every year and they don’t ever want to change it. That leads to a very different type of solution where they can’t handle a 1-minute load/unload cycle — it has to be 1-2 seconds, maximum. 

“Other considerations include how they are doing maintenance — does each operator maintain their own machine or is it a regular cycle for the shop? What about probing, tool checks, tooling vendors? What do they have now and use for chip and coolant management? Although those don’t sound like automation questions because it’s machine-tool focused, all of these factors go into whether the automation is going to be successful or not. If you don’t have tools that are going to last a whole shift, but you have three day’s worth of parts on an infeed conveyor, that won’t do you much good! So these are the types of questions I get into every day when I talk with customers about automation cells.”

Grow your business without growing headcount

Star said they do an in-depth ROI analysis with customers. “If you were making this on a RoboDrill in a standard three-axis set up, what does that dollar figure look like for machine cost, hours, uptime and revenue? Now let’s transpose that with automation and see what the new revenue opportunity looks like. That goes for the people side of the business, too. With automation, they can spend more time on application and engineering work and let the machine do what it’s built to do,” he continued. “We look to help them maximize their people so an operator who might be moving materials or punching details into a control could be resourced to more strategic or complex matters in their business. If you’re spending fewer hours on engineering and programming your productivity rate is being lost from the human capital side and you’re not maximizing their talent and potential.”

Automation showroom at Methods Machine Tools.

“NS Precision is a great example of how automation can help a business because they are a two- or three- person shop. Other small shop owners may be thinking that they’re too small for automation because they can manage the machine. If you’re that small, you’re the operator and owner, and automation can help you spend more time just being the owner and bringing in business. Similar to how small shops may view five-axis machining, thinking a one-person shop can’t really get into something that complex, we help them understand it really is more profitable for them in the long run because they can run hundreds of hours consecutively and grow the business.”

Methods looks at automation as a turnkey, custom solution for their customers. “We look at it from a holistic sense and aren’t just an integrator who will build the cell for you,” Star stated. “Our operation runs the full gamut from automating small tasks to full automation cells for companies with one employee or thousands.” 

For shop owners considering what automation might do for them, they need to think about the targets they want to achieve each day, week, month, or year, and find a partner that will run the scenarios with them. Star said, “With the cost of doing business continuing to rise, tries to really deliver for our customers by helping them look at things from a total business perspective and not just at the application level. We win when we can help them drive a more profitable and healthier business.”

SolidCAM’s is an ideal solution!

The modules are affordable, integrated into  and easy to implement. SolidShop can even serve as a Manufacturing Execution System (MES), bringing real-time visibility and control to the entire shop floor.

Manipulate NC code and automate programming with Editor

Designed to bridge the gap between CAM programmers and shop floor operators, SolidShop provides a seamless, real-time solution for managing G-code, tracking production and eliminating costly mistakes. Built on SolidCAM’s proven expertise and CIMCO’s industry-leading technology, SolidShop creates a fully integrated digital ecosystem that boosts productivity, prevents errors and maximizes machine uptime. Whether you are running a small job shop or a large-scale manufacturing operation, SolidShop gives you total control over your shop floor, without the headaches.

Robust communication with CNC controls allows uploading and downloading programs and signal capturing from PLCs or sensors.

SolidShop is not just another shop-floor tool, it’s a complete digital ecosystem that extends SolidCAM’s reach beyond the CAM programming department into every corner of the CNC shop floor. From NC code verification, through operator simulation and editing, DNC and machine monitoring, paperless manufacturing PDM, as well as ERP integration, SolidShop delivers real-time control, increases productivity and reduces downtime. SolidShop offers a modular approach with three progressive levels, enabling shops to scale their digital capabilities with ease.

Step 1: Ensure the Right G-Code, Every Time

Ask any programmer or operator — version control is a necessity. Files get renamed, modified, overwritten or pulled from the wrong folder. That one small mistake? It can lead to major costs on the shop floor.

Machine simulator detects collisions and axis overtravel and offers fast material removal situation among many other features.

With SolidShop’s NC Program Editor and G-Code driven simulation module, shops gain full control over G-code. Errors are caught before they happen. Collisions are avoided before they become costly. This simple step alone eliminates countless hours of rework and scrap.

“SolidShop has made it nearly impossible for the wrong G-Code to reach the machine,” says one production supervisor. “That peace of mind is worth everything.”

Step 2: Replace Paper Trails with Digital Traceability

As quality standards rise and compliance becomes critical, shops need more than tribal knowledge and clipboard notes. SolidShop introduces its Manufacturing PDM and SolidCAM for Operators, digitizing job packets, drawings and revision histories. Changes in NC programs and manufacturing documents are meticulously tracked. Granular access controls and protects the information from being exfiltrated from the company and meets the most stringent needs in an era where cybersecurity is a permanent concern.

Product Data Management manages all types of documents in a centralized database accessible to anyone in the company.

Operators access everything they need at the machine — no binders, no misprints, no chasing down programmers for answers. Every file, drawing and setup instruction is available in real time, with full traceability from a central database. Everyone in the company sees the same information, paperlessly, from anywhere, stopping the pain during audits.

Merge, manage and revert the operators’ changes made directly at the CNC control. Review program modifications before incorporating them into the released version. Manage the relationships between main and subprograms optimally and send them all to the machine with a click. All this with the possibility of full integration with the DNC module.

Step 3: Connect Your Machines—and Your Business

Here’s where it all comes together.

Real-time machine monitoring with interface to shop ERP, FMS, Power BI, TCP connections and more.

With real-time machine monitoring, DNC communication, and ERP/MES integration, SolidShop gives shop managers and business leaders full visibility into their operations.

See exactly when machines are cutting — and when and why they’re not. Track jobs. Eliminate bottlenecks. Make decisions faster with real-time shop data at your fingertips.

SolidShop’s dashboard allows the operator or manageer to see utilization rates and downtime on each cell or machine.

One job shop reported a 23% increase in spindle uptime after implementing SolidShop. “We finally have eyes on everything. Scheduling is tighter. Mistakes are down. Profitability is up.”

Built for the Real World

SolidShop wasn’t built in a boardroom; it was born on the shop floor.

During a visit to a SolidCAM customer in Germany, CEO and founder Dr. Emil Somekh saw them struggling to manage production with spreadsheets and disconnected tools, despite having invested in high-end CNC machines and top talent. After witnessing their transformation using CIMCO’s technology — boosting productivity by more than 20% — Dr. Somekh realized that this was the foundation for building something bigger.

That vision became SolidShop: a robust, real-world ecosystem designed to bring digital manufacturing to life for CNC shops everywhere.

SolidShop was designed with flexibility in mind. Whether you are running a couple of machines or a full-scale manufacturing operation, you can start small and scale up. The platform is modular, so you implement only what you need, when you need it.

And with SolidCAM as your single vendor, there’s no finger-pointing between vendors and the IT department, or integration headaches. Everything works together out of the box, just how it should.

The Bottom Line

For shops ready to move past outdated processes and into the future of manufacturing, SolidShop delivers a smarter, more connected shop floor —without the pain of a massive system overhaul.

“SolidShop was built to meet the real challenges our customers face every day,” says Somekh. “It’s about eliminating waste, increasing control and unlocking the full potential of every CNC machine on the floor. Over the years, manufacturing shops have consistently upgraded their CNC machines and CAM technologies. However, the tools to manage and deliver shop floor information or handle connectivity and NC program management pains are often obsolete and ineffective. SolidShop is the answer to all these pains. It’s a proven productivity booster for everyone in the shop.”

SolidShop brings Industry 4.0 capabilities to CNC machine shops of all sizes — whether small, medium or big. It’s affordable, scalable and easy to implement.

Want to see SolidShop in action? Book your personalized demo today and take the first step toward total control of your CNC operations.

These automated guided vehicles (AGVs) at DMG MORI’s assembly plant in Tortona, Italy, will soon serve as active transport systems to guide DMG MORI’s universal turning centers through different stages of the assembly process. Source: Brent Donaldson, ¸ßÅâÂÊÁùºÏ²Ê

The French phrase “déjà rêvé,” or “already dreamt,” is the feeling that you’ve dreamed about an experience you are having in the moment. Like déjà vu with a surreal twist, this feeling snuck up on me during a recent tour of DMG MORI’s assembly plant in Tortona, Italy. I was standing in the middle of a large, open, white-floored assembly room lined with massive automated guided vehicles (AGVs) sitting dormant in neat rows around the edge of the facility. When these slow-moving robots are activated in the coming months, they will serve as active transport systems, using optical navigation and laser scanning technologies to guide DMG MORI’s universal turning centers through different stages of the assembly process. Standing in the middle of these towering robots-at-rest evoked a strong childhood vision of the future.

Like the steady pace of these AGVs — which travel approximately 1.77 inches per minute and are already in use at the company’s Pfronten, Germany facility — we are clearly moving toward a collective vision of fully-automated production. From small job shops to large captive operations, it is now common to find connected devices offering instant feedback loops, increasingly underpinned by artificial intelligence (AI). Robots and cobots are nearly ubiquitous. Digital twins and simulation are growing increasingly sophisticated. And at the center of it all is data.

Our May, 2025 print edition offers five stories that unpack data-driven manufacturing and showcase its role in a variety of shop settings. Incidentally, this is the first print edition of ¸ßÅâÂÊÁùºÏ²Ê in recent memory dedicated solely to a single technology topic (albeit a broad one) and how that technology is being deployed in real time at American companies.

Let’s start with AI’s role in discrete part manufacturing — a topic prone to wildly varying interpretations within our industry. “Enhancing the Shop Floor With AI” (page 48) examines AI’s function across a host of production steps, beginning with its ability to serve as a “CAM co-pilot.” ¸ßÅâÂÊÁùºÏ²Ê readers are by now likely familiar with AI technologies that help generate tool paths (arguably AI’s most common use today outside of predictive maintenance) but here we explore its ability to detect early signs of chatter, optimize energy use and even enhance ergonomics through human simulation. The article shows how AI can be used to amplify human expertise and allow shop-specific knowledge to seamlessly integrate with the shop floor. This article is clear evidence that AI’s capabilities will only grow as digitalization becomes commonplace in job shops, producing ever-higher quantities of AI fuel: data.

Our next story takes this principle and extends it into the CNC itself. On page 42, Senior Associate Editor Eli Plaskett offers an intriguing look at Gemineers, a German startup that has developed a machine-connected digital twin that captures spindle loads, axis motion and positional errors with ±10-micron resolution to provide real-time process insights. Gemineers’ closed-loop system doesn’t just simulate machining, it also predicts errors, diagnoses failures mid-cut and refines future production runs. By offering real-time feedback in addition to foresight, the company believes its digital twin is precise enough to minimize the need for quality inspection or at least shift its role.

Closer to home, LeClaire Manufacturing, an aluminum casting and precision component shop in Bettendorf, Iowa, offers a different method of tracing issues back to their root cause. On page 62, Senior Associate Editor Evan Doran profiles the company’s Caddis system, a custom, cloud-connected software platform developed by LeClaire that tracks essential metrics such as uptime, temperature, amperage and cycle times, then sets alerts based on deviations from each metric’s norm. By tracking essential data to inform real-time decisions, the Caddis system has reduced setup times by two-thirds, decreased unplanned downtime and increased machine utilization by 38% — all without investing in new equipment.

On page 54, Doran walks us through a different challenge when tracking data — how to make sense of it within a complex, interconnected workflow on the shop floor. While MachineMetrics has long been known as a machine monitoring provider, the company is evolving its platform into something closer to a manufacturing execution system (MES) by integrating machine data with ERP schedules and AI-driven analytics. In both high-production and high-mix settings, this rich data stew can be contextualized to provide real-time feedback on cycle times, tool load anomalies and production delays. Doran’s article shows how meaning, not just volume, represents data’s true power on the shop floor.

Finally, on page 58, Doran spotlights how Woodward Inc., a precision manufacturer serving the aerospace and power generation industries, has evolved into a true “digital factory” through Caron Engineering’s MiConnect software. Previously, Woodward spent months building custom APIs to connect its CNC machines to its SCADA software, but today, MiConnect allows them to not only streamline data collection from a diverse array of controls but also supports bidirectional feedback and facilitates real-time adjustments, robotic integration and automated tool compensations across sites. The story also reveals why this level of digital integration requires sophisticated engineers to helm the controls and showcases the critical importance of human expertise to maximize data-driven manufacturing technologies.

So what do these stories tell us?

Each of the companies highlighted in this issue uses data to enhance, not eclipse, human ingenuity. They use data as a force multiplier, but in distinct ways for distinct purposes. From small shops building their own monitoring systems to global producers synchronizing multi-plant operations, the lesson that connects these stories is clarity. The ability to see what’s happening at your shop is important, but understanding why it’s happening allows you to refine your processes and, ultimately, redefine what’s possible.

Mark: My father worked at another manufacturing company making gun drills. He must have done work on Saturday morning, so my brother and I had to go in and we were exposed to a larger shop.

They were making gun drills, and we were mechanically minded, so we loved it. We loved going in there. This was in the 1970s, when we were elementary school-age kids, and then we had tools. And then when he bought his plastic machine shop in 1985, I was in high school. And so I started working for him on the weekends.

Nancy: I was completely left out of all of the mechanical musing that were going on at our house. And I pursued a totally different path.

About 25 years ago, my mother was working together with my father in their business. She did the bookkeeping, and she wanted to retire. So they recruited me to leave my job in Boston and come down to Connecticut and work in the shop and learn everything about all the financial information, the tax information. I ended up doing a lot more than my mother did because I took over website advertising, customer service, things that she didn't do.

Mark: I approached Nancy and — we've always gotten along. We've always been like minded as far as siblings. We don't argue. We understand each other and it was a natural fit.

Mark and Nancy Rohlfs left their family shop to start their on January 1^st, 2006. Over the past 19 years, they’ve managed risks and opportunities to grow from a garage shop to a 10,000-square-foot facility producing plastic parts.

Nancy: I think that we were both ready for a new opportunity and wanted to make a change and it was at the right time in our lives where we could do both. Take some risk and start a business.

Mark’s the risk taker. I am more risk averse, which is probably a good balance between the two of us.

We don't come to disagreements too often because we always will go with “who's the expert on this decision,” and then they get to make it. So if you're not the expert, you can put in your two cents, but you don't get to make the final decision.

Mark: Yeah, even if I'm not the expert, Nancy still lets me make the decision if it affects my work and I'm the one working in that environment.

Nancy: Mark has a lot of “out of the box” schemes, and East Coast has been a good opportunity for him to test them out. And I like to remind him of the times he's made some questionable decisions. But for the most part, I say he's batting at least 95% on his schemes ending up working out.

Mark: What we learned is patience and stringing our finances along and being stingy and innovative. So you have to have years of patience and you have to have enough money upfront to string you along through all the lean years. And if you add one customer a year, you have to think, “Go 20 years out and this is gonna be something.” We take a long view.

Nancy: We're kind of in a small industry, which is — I think — good in a way. As long as you make a good product, you're reliable, you have good pricing and good customer service, it allows you to kind of differentiate yourself within a smaller group. The metal shops that are in the United States, or even our competitors, if they're doing metal they are much larger. And I think it would be harder to break into that business than plastic.