Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
#425 Machining graphite
1.8k Plays18 hours ago
TOPICS:
- Argon purging heat treat bags
- Revisiting tool life in steel
- Tapping, form tapping, threadmilling
- Machining graphite
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Episode 425
00:00:01
johngrimsmo
Good morning and welcome to the Business of Machining episode 425. My name is Jon Grimsmo.
00:00:06
John Saunders
And my name is John Saunders.
00:00:09
johngrimsmo
And this is your weekly manufacturing podcast where we talk about kind of what's going on in our manufacturing
Challenges in Heat Treating Blades
00:00:14
johngrimsmo
journeys. And I have some heat treat discussions for today.
00:00:19
John Saunders
Bring it on.
00:00:19
johngrimsmo
Yeah. um So you've got your heat treat oven and we've had ours for like 12 years. um We've heat treated all of our blades since almost not not quite forever, but almost forever.
00:00:30
johngrimsmo
Um, and the button for our fjell knife, the button lock, it's this, uh, very ah just over quarter inch diameter head, but with a very skinny eighth inch shaft and a bunch of little features and stuff.
00:00:36
John Saunders
no
00:00:46
johngrimsmo
And we've tried all kinds of different ways. We've been talking about this for a year and a half now. Um, yeah, exactly.
00:00:52
John Saunders
You and I have, right? This is the... but Okay, great.
00:00:55
johngrimsmo
The button issues. Um, so we're machining them soft and we're heat treating the individual parts in a stainless steel foil bag.
00:01:03
John Saunders
Okay.
00:01:05
John Saunders
Yep.
00:01:05
johngrimsmo
um And all steels, we've tried probably seven or eight steel so far. But now we're trying ah what's called 420 V, aka a s 90 V in the knife world.
00:01:16
John Saunders
OK.
00:01:17
johngrimsmo
um So we're trying that. And we're getting weird results out of this one steel. And um so we made we've heat treated these five test parts.
00:01:29
johngrimsmo
And I go to put one in the knife and it won't fit.
00:01:32
John Saunders
Oh.
00:01:33
johngrimsmo
And I'm like, okay, weird. Let me make it. It turns out the part that there's this little bell at the bottom where the spring goes in that it's ovalizing.
00:01:44
johngrimsmo
It's like supposed to be a circle, but now it's an oval.
00:01:45
John Saunders
OK. Yeah. Okay.
00:01:48
johngrimsmo
And when you make it, you can make a five thou difference on this cylindrical surface. That's supposed to have two dense variation. Like five thou, what the heck? So it's like several thou over and several thou under in other 90 degrees.
00:01:58
John Saunders
Yeah. Yeah.
00:02:02
johngrimsmo
so And now I take it to the microscope and I go and look and I'm like, dude, this thing's an oval, like it got squished.
00:02:09
John Saunders
Mm-hmm.
00:02:09
johngrimsmo
Okay. How many of these got squished? Like most of them. And there's one of them that's barely fits properly. If I, you know, sand it down a little bit. I'm like, what?
00:02:21
johngrimsmo
And so my conclusion is, and a little bit of Googling and chat GPTing, um the, I forget the exact word for it, but the softness of this steel at red hot at critical is softer than most other steels.
00:02:34
johngrimsmo
So it's literally like clay or softer.
00:02:34
John Saunders
Literally, it's turning to honey. Right.
00:02:38
johngrimsmo
And, you know, the question is under its own gravity or in the vacuum action of the bag, eating up all the oxygen inside the bag that sucks flat or that plus the gravity, or when we pull it out and tap it against the aluminum plate to quench it,
00:02:50
johngrimsmo
Is that dinging it? Like, I don't know, but something is happening and these parts are deforming.
00:02:53
John Saunders
right
00:02:57
johngrimsmo
And in the head, which is a bigger diameter disc that's like stronger, um there is an actual dent in one of them. And like, this is wild.
00:03:09
John Saunders
Okay, good.
00:03:09
johngrimsmo
None of the other steels had this problem.
00:03:12
John Saunders
You turn these on a knock or Swiss or...
00:03:15
johngrimsmo
Swiss, yeah. Yeah, and we verified the the soft parts.
00:03:16
John Saunders
okay and
00:03:19
johngrimsmo
They are perfect.
00:03:20
John Saunders
Okay, yeah. And I'm just like, I'm trying to be a fly on the wall in your shop.
00:03:21
johngrimsmo
Totally, yeah.
00:03:24
John Saunders
Then somebody carries them over to the other building. Somebody puts them foil bag. You crimp the ends.
00:03:30
johngrimsmo
Yep.
00:03:30
John Saunders
then they just lay them the heat on a rack or something.
00:03:32
johngrimsmo
Exactly, yeah And we we learned not to put too many in a bag because they can stick together a little bit or they can not heat treat the middle ones if the outside ones get the heat first kind of thing.
00:03:33
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:03:36
John Saunders
Mm-hmm.
00:03:42
johngrimsmo
um So we put them in like five or 10 in a bag, which is very few.
00:03:46
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:03:46
johngrimsmo
and And they are distorting. in a way that none of the other steels did. I'm like, this is crazy. Now we're getting 63 or 64 Rockwell, depending on, we did two different tests.
00:03:58
John Saunders
Ooh, yeah.
00:03:59
johngrimsmo
So they're, they're hard, which is good. Um, yeah.
00:04:01
John Saunders
After temper? Whoa, that's legit.
Innovations in Heat Treatment Techniques
00:04:05
johngrimsmo
Yeah. That's like good. Um, and I felt I needed the hardness, like we were getting from the M two, we're getting the 64 and it's working.
00:04:06
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:04:14
johngrimsmo
So we want to try this for 20 um But yeah, they're like weirdly soft and at upper critical temperature. So what I learned is that I can machine a graphite heat treat fixture out of solid graphite.
00:04:29
John Saunders
Okay.
00:04:30
johngrimsmo
And I'm like, okay, go to McMaster first, obviously. And yeah, they sell graphite. They sell two kinds, one really cheap and one really expensive. One is isostatically pressed or whatever, which is much denser.
00:04:42
johngrimsmo
um And then the other one is just the cheap one. ah that is more porous and more brittle, but like easier.
00:04:49
John Saunders
Okay.
00:04:50
johngrimsmo
They have little release sticks that are half inch by half inch by three inches long. i'm like, they're perfect.
00:04:54
John Saunders
okay
00:04:55
johngrimsmo
So just bought a bunch of those and I can put them in the router with dust filter, dust suction, and just kind of mill some holes in them.
00:04:59
John Saunders
oh
00:05:03
johngrimsmo
And this, not only that, but it gives a fixture to support the button so that any effects of gravity, any bumping, any whatever are eliminated.
00:05:10
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:05:16
John Saunders
you I'm curious if you can use and are going to use the cheaper graphite or you had to buy the more expensive?
00:05:21
johngrimsmo
So, cause the cheaper, I'm air quoting, cheaper one is like, I forget what they were, somewhere between five and $15 per little block, like not much.
00:05:31
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:05:32
johngrimsmo
And then the other block is $200, but it's much bigger.
00:05:34
John Saunders
Cool.
00:05:35
johngrimsmo
It's four by six inches, not half inch by three.
00:05:39
John Saunders
Okay.
00:05:40
johngrimsmo
And I broke it down and I'm like, oh, it's actually the same volume, like same price per cubic inch, but you just have to buy the bigger one.
00:05:45
John Saunders
Okay, yeah.
00:05:47
John Saunders
Got
00:05:47
johngrimsmo
um So I bought the not pressed one that should be more brittle and who cares?
00:05:53
johngrimsmo
It's a test.
00:05:53
John Saunders
The cheaper one.
00:05:54
johngrimsmo
It's experiment. Yeah, exactly.
00:05:54
John Saunders
Yeah. Sure, sure, sure, sure.
00:05:56
johngrimsmo
So I think I spent $30 on test samples and I'm like, yeah, they came in and I unboxed them and I'm like, give me a piece of paper. And I drew on it. Like, I'm like, this is, this is lead.
00:06:07
johngrimsmo
Like,
00:06:08
John Saunders
but you, you drew on the graph or use the graphite to draw on paper.
00:06:10
johngrimsmo
I used the graphite as a pencil and I'm like, this is literally graphite.
00:06:12
John Saunders
That's awesome.
00:06:13
johngrimsmo
Like, and then I was like, wait, what's in a pencil lead?
00:06:16
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:06:17
johngrimsmo
Is it just graphite? No, it's graphite and clay.
00:06:20
John Saunders
Well, that's now what I'm wondering, John, you gotta take a number two pencil and I guess the wood would just burn off, which maybe wouldn't hurt anything.
00:06:23
johngrimsmo
Yup.
00:06:28
John Saunders
Although don't do this at home people, but I'm like, what what happens if you put a, what happens if you put pencil lead in a,
00:06:29
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:06:32
johngrimsmo
Well, the clay, the clay and pencil lead, I don't know what it would do in a hot oven, but it'd be weird. Um,
00:06:38
John Saunders
Well, but you fire clay at like, I mean, I'm going to make this up at 4,000 C.
00:06:40
johngrimsmo
There's lots of different kinds of clay.
00:06:43
John Saunders
Like it's hot.
00:06:43
johngrimsmo
yeah Exactly.
00:06:45
John Saunders
It likes it warmer.
00:06:45
johngrimsmo
Yeah. Yeah. So um and then the other thing I learned is that graphite can withstand ah vacuum heat tree temperatures up to lake like, like 5000 C or something like dumb, dumb.
00:06:47
John Saunders
Huh.
00:07:00
John Saunders
Where's the clay, isn't
00:07:01
johngrimsmo
Yeah. However, up to, I think it's 900 or 900 Fahrenheit. I can't remember. um It can live in the oxygen environment, but anything above that, it starts to break down if it's in an oxygen environment.
00:07:13
johngrimsmo
So even in the foil bag with oxygen all around it it won't like that oxygen.
00:07:18
John Saunders
OK.
00:07:19
johngrimsmo
so i finally ah got an argon tank for my tig welder that i haven't ever used um so i went to the welding store and i got this argon tank and i'm like while i'm here i need a helmet a tig welding helmet and gloves anyway because i've been putting that off now that i have the tank and i have the tig welder it's
00:07:23
John Saunders
and Yeah.
00:07:36
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:07:37
johngrimsmo
Anyway, um so I built, I 3D printed this little argon filling station with just a little ball valve.
00:07:43
John Saunders
Nice.
00:07:46
johngrimsmo
So it's up off the table like 10 inches. so you can put the bag under there and fill it real nice.
00:07:50
John Saunders
OK.
00:07:51
johngrimsmo
um And argon's heavier than air.
00:07:52
John Saunders
Argon heavier.
00:07:54
johngrimsmo
So the goal, argon being an inert gas that is non-toxic, non-flammable, non-anything, and it's heavier than air, it will displace all of the oxygen in the bag and push all the air out.
00:08:05
johngrimsmo
And then you know how you sometimes put a piece of paper in the heat treat bag to consume the oxygen?
00:08:11
John Saunders
OK. OK. which I've heard well, this is the worst thing to say. i have heard, but can't vouch for that that has been debunked as not doing anything, but um' not I'm not here to die on that hill.
00:08:20
johngrimsmo
Oh.
00:08:23
johngrimsmo
So, okay, I can add a little bit to that. We've tested it a bit. um But anyway, if, because we we haven't been using Argon Purge in the in the bags ever,
00:08:36
johngrimsmo
The blades are thin enough that the bag sucks down and it is like complete vacuum sealed, just like a food package.
00:08:39
John Saunders
Yep.
00:08:43
johngrimsmo
You know, it's like totally no air inside.
00:08:45
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:08:47
johngrimsmo
um So apparently if you put a piece of paper in there and there's any oxygen inside, the paper will char and turn black. In an argon purged bag, if you put the paper in there, it might come out white.
00:08:58
John Saunders
That's sick.
00:08:59
johngrimsmo
Right. And I need to test this because I just need to know.
00:09:01
John Saunders
Oh, that's awesome.
00:09:02
johngrimsmo
i mean, and that's what ChatGPT is telling me anyway. But um I think that would be really cool. It's just to like see a piece of paper come out white after it's been at 2000 degrees.
00:09:10
John Saunders
Yes.
00:09:12
johngrimsmo
And that that that will prove that you're you have no oxygen, that the Argon purge worked, that it actually, you know, there's no color.
00:09:12
John Saunders
That has like viral. It's insane.
00:09:20
johngrimsmo
You can't really tell.
00:09:22
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:09:22
johngrimsmo
um i guess you could put a match in it because it's non flammable, but it would go out.
00:09:28
John Saunders
Yeah, yeah.
00:09:29
johngrimsmo
in the argon? i don't know, actually. Yeah, it wouldn't burn.
00:09:31
John Saunders
Well, yeah, because it fired you the fire, fire, pure triangle, whatever, yeah.
00:09:33
johngrimsmo
It needs oxygen.
00:09:35
John Saunders
yeah
00:09:35
johngrimsmo
Exactly. so Wow.
00:09:36
John Saunders
Fuel heat. The... I'm betraying, well, don't really care, no pride here. I'm betraying my own kind of like, I should have known this as a reasonably ah person who likes to know how things work in the world, but, um, char cloth.
00:09:50
John Saunders
So when I visited click spring, which is now eight years ago, which seems crazy or seven, he, we were making and selling his, uh, fire shirt pistons.
00:09:58
johngrimsmo
What the fire starter thingies.
00:10:00
John Saunders
And so I needed more char cloth and we're in his living room and asking something about it. And they have a, um, a small, I don't know if it's a wood burner or a pellet stove, but you a way to heat the house or something.
00:10:15
John Saunders
And he's like, I just make it here. And I'm like, what? And then I'm like, wait, I'm going to, I'm gonna ask that awkward question. Like, you know, asking for a friend, how do you make char cloth? And it's actually really simple. You just take the flammable cloth stuff and you light it on fire or you put it in a heat environment where there's no oxygen.
00:10:34
johngrimsmo
Huh?
00:10:34
John Saunders
So it's sort and I'm going to, Layman's explain it. Somebody check this if they want, but basically it completes sort of like two of the three legs of the fire pyramid. Like it makes it really really, really, really, really ready to catch on fire, but it hasn't quite caught on fire if
Considerations in Equipment and Setup
00:10:46
John Saunders
you will.
00:10:46
John Saunders
Um, I, that's a probably a terrible explanation.
00:10:49
johngrimsmo
Yeah. Yeah.
00:10:49
John Saunders
Um, but, um, char cloth. Yeah. You, um, if you light it on fire inside like a mint Altoids tin, then it burns off. Gosh, I'm i'm feeling embarrassed.
00:11:02
John Saunders
It burns off the stuff that it can and it just leaves the stuff that's really happy to light on fire later. Sorry.
00:11:06
johngrimsmo
Yeah. Huh.
00:11:10
John Saunders
I'd be very curious see what you learn on that. If you could pull a piece of paper out of that and do a math problem on it after it's been through a tooth, that tooth very legit.
00:11:15
johngrimsmo
Yeah, right. Exactly. So on the consuming oxygen inside the bag thing, um when we put our, let me think here, when we put the blades in the bag, because the blades are thin and the bags are rectangular and very thin, there's not a lot of oxygen inside left.
00:11:35
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:11:35
johngrimsmo
And I keep wondering, like when they come out, they are vacuum sealed. What, where's the oxygen going?
00:11:41
John Saunders
Oh.
00:11:42
johngrimsmo
What is consuming the oxygen? Is it the bag? Is it the blade? Obviously you want the bag to turn black and not your blade to turn black.
00:11:47
John Saunders
oh
00:11:51
johngrimsmo
So something has to consume that oxygen. And it's kind of both, I believe. The blade a little bit and the bag mostly is consuming the oxygen until there's no more left and then it's vacuum sealed.
00:12:01
johngrimsmo
um So the trick with the paper is that the paper is supposed to help a little bit consume some of that oxygen as well and help it vacuum seal.
00:12:11
John Saunders
Now that you say all that, that's my now vague jostling of memory of the argument I heard. Number one, the oxygen that would be needed to burn the paper or matchstick is de minimis compared to the volume of oxygen that could be in the bag.
00:12:25
John Saunders
Now, I know you can argue about how much you try to push out voids, but nevertheless, that stands true.
00:12:25
johngrimsmo
Right.
00:12:28
johngrimsmo
yeah
00:12:29
John Saunders
But also, that was the punchline. The manufacturers of these stainless steel grades or... the stainless steel itself that's used has a sacrificial element in it, which that is materially significantly more capable of doing that.
00:12:39
johngrimsmo
Mm-hmm.
00:12:44
John Saunders
So the, the, the, it's like bringing a cup of sand to the beach.
00:12:46
johngrimsmo
Ah, the paper's kind of irrelevant.
00:12:49
John Saunders
It's like, no, step back. I got this.
00:12:49
johngrimsmo
Yeah, yeah.
00:12:51
johngrimsmo
Well, I mean, we go through ah thousands of blood bags over years. um They are black on the outside where there's rich oxygen environment in the oven.
00:13:00
John Saunders
Yeah. Yeah.
00:13:01
johngrimsmo
And then on the inside, they're like tan straw color. um So they're getting even a little bit and our blades come out kind of golden. So clearly there's a little bit of a reaction on the blades, but...
00:13:12
johngrimsmo
not enough to make them turn black or blue or anything like that, unless there's a little puncture in the corner of the bla bag um or a laser well didn't get properly sealed or the the crimp that we put on it isn't good or whatever.
00:13:18
John Saunders
Right.
00:13:24
johngrimsmo
um But the smaller parts that we heat treat, they don't necessarily vacuum... as flat because the part is small. So there's not a lot of mass to the part. um And there's a lot of relative oxygen in the bag because of all the contours and features and empty spaces.
00:13:40
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:13:41
johngrimsmo
And so they do come out more discolored, more purple, brown, black kind of thing.
00:13:45
John Saunders
Mm-hmm.
00:13:47
johngrimsmo
um And then apparently with an Argon purge, the bag won't even suck down at all.
00:13:52
John Saunders
That'd be interesting.
00:13:53
johngrimsmo
It'll come out puffy still, which will be kind of cool.
00:13:57
John Saunders
Argon's relatively cheap, or least it's not expensive. So only you could do, John, is um before you shut the door to the oven, just do an argon purge of the oven interior. It's not going to be perfect, but again, you're going to take 100 units of oxygen. You might bring it down by 50% 80%. I...
00:14:13
johngrimsmo
yeah would you have like i know hotshot has this add-on where you can argon purge constantly or something andt I've never I've watched a couple videos on it
00:14:18
John Saunders
yeah
00:14:22
John Saunders
We own that add on because it was super cheap, but never even hooked up. For us, it didn't do any good because you would still end up, you can't finish the cycle.
00:14:34
John Saunders
You can't.
00:14:34
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:14:34
johngrimsmo
when When you open the door, oxygen just comes in. Is that why or?
00:14:39
John Saunders
That's what it is. It wouldn't let you, it wouldn't stop you from using the foil bag. You could still use it it it would probably help.
00:14:43
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:14:46
John Saunders
But for us, the bag cost was the bags are, those are, they're whatever, two to five bucks a piece.
00:14:51
johngrimsmo
Exactly. Yep.
00:14:54
John Saunders
The other thing you could do on solicited suggestion is, you heat treating out, sending out parts heat treat is not expensive. um Make 20 of them and send them to somebody, ah professional heat treater that can do them vacuum furnace and just see if they deform there.
00:15:05
johngrimsmo
yeah
00:15:10
John Saunders
I guess you're, well, sorry.
00:15:11
johngrimsmo
It's all how you hold them too, right? like It would prove the vacuum side of it and the the quality of the heat treat, the hardness and all that stuff.
00:15:12
John Saunders
and No, yeah, you're right. Maybe that doesn't do any good.
00:15:18
John Saunders
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:15:20
John Saunders
That was a dumb idea.
00:15:20
johngrimsmo
um
00:15:21
johngrimsmo
But we like we like control. Yeah.
00:15:23
John Saunders
No, no, I know, but, well, you are the control. You use somebody else as, like, a...
00:15:27
johngrimsmo
and as a validation.
00:15:29
John Saunders
Sure.
00:15:30
johngrimsmo
Yeah. Well, I know Renzetti's talked about this a lot.
00:15:31
John Saunders
I'm last... Good.
00:15:33
johngrimsmo
ah One of the places, is it solar atmospheres? um They have a location that specifies specifically does like small parts in full vacuum for austenitizing and tempering, like you know many hours.
00:15:43
John Saunders
Okay.
00:15:48
johngrimsmo
so um and he he'll It's cost more, but he'll send parts there and they come back the same, like silver.
00:15:52
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:15:55
John Saunders
Yeah. if you vacuum temper, it's, it's just purging gas over them to it's expensive though.
00:15:57
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:16:01
johngrimsmo
Yeah, exactly.
00:16:01
John Saunders
I tell you, did I tell you we priced one those ovens
00:16:04
johngrimsmo
ah Tell me again.
00:16:06
John Saunders
from solar, we were sure of putting together the business case on around, you know, puck, puck chuck.
00:16:09
johngrimsmo
Like a small one, I assume.
00:16:11
John Saunders
Well, I mean, yes, I think it was small relative to their offerings, but it was probably the size of your brother.
00:16:18
johngrimsmo
Yeah. Yeah.
00:16:18
John Saunders
I mean, it's a machine, um and very capable, very reasonable. hourly run rate. i mean, you're using electricity, but, um, very interesting and capable of doing, I forget, I could pull the specs up, you know, a couple hundred pounds per cycle. You could do, I'm pretty sure you could do the vacuum. The thing I didn't understand until at some point in this process is heat treat under vacuum is like no big deal to vacuum, to vacuum temper with an air hardening material, you need to be purging gas through the parts, like constantly blowing, like think about opening your air compressor nozzle, but instead of it being air, it's argon that's going.
00:16:56
johngrimsmo
To quench, not for two hour temper.
00:16:59
John Saunders
Oh, DuQuint, I'm sorry, thank you, John.
00:17:01
John Saunders
But then you bring, then you temper, yeah, thank you. um So you're consuming, I think, a lot more gas.
00:17:01
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:17:05
johngrimsmo
Mm-hmm.
00:17:05
John Saunders
Anyway, punchline is the oven was the same as like four VF2s.
00:17:10
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:17:11
John Saunders
Like, they you know, yeah, exactly.
00:17:11
johngrimsmo
Like several hundred thousand. Yeah, yeah.
00:17:14
John Saunders
So as a service, relatively inexpensive. That's like everything. It seems like it's the freight to and from it adds such a layer of complexity around packet packaging.
00:17:22
johngrimsmo
Yeah, and the scheduling and, yeah.
00:17:26
johngrimsmo
Yep, exactly. So, well, it's funny, Angela was just looking into um DLC coding chambers, and which we've looked into many times before.
00:17:33
John Saunders
Oh, oh, out of zero.
00:17:35
johngrimsmo
Yeah, exactly. And yeah, there are many, many hundreds of thousands, if not over a million, depending on how big you want. um But we're starting to do a lot more. Like we're sending out batches every week now.
00:17:49
John Saunders
Didn't you look at a DIY?
00:17:52
johngrimsmo
I'd heard whispers and I don't know.
00:17:55
John Saunders
Okay. It's like the Tormach or a DIY version of an EDM that has been talked about for like 14 years and nobody has ever done it for reasons of probably just, yeah, exactly, reasons.
00:18:03
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:18:05
johngrimsmo
Reasons. Yeah. And I mean, we're so quality control. We need results, not just cheap DIY. Um, I'm sure there's a way to do it.
00:18:14
John Saunders
where
00:18:15
johngrimsmo
I mean, yeah.
00:18:15
John Saunders
Million dollar DLC machine, I might be willing to endorse some.
00:18:17
johngrimsmo
Yeah. So DIY, our coding company has it air quote, invented their own PVD chambers for the past, you know, 30 years. so um and And I've been there. It's a hodgepodge, but it works.
00:18:32
John Saunders
Interesting.
00:18:33
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:18:33
John Saunders
Yeah, it works, works. There's all sorts of, I mean, this is, I think the, one of those philosophical questions that neither you nor I will ever answer, but like, at what point do you recognize we're in the business of making knives quit trying to build support equipment versus, hey, brother made their own CNC machines for to make sewing machines, I believe.
00:18:53
John Saunders
Heckler and Koch, Koch the gun maker, I believe, I've always heard had their whole line of their own DIY VMCs that just rolled their own. and
00:18:53
johngrimsmo
yeah
00:19:00
johngrimsmo
Nice.
00:19:00
John Saunders
Um, lots of people that have, I believe Sandvik has done this and so it's carbide companies with their own presses and their own centering stuff.
00:19:08
John Saunders
Like now these are companies that have deep seated engineering talents beyond what you I have, but, um, yeah, so I'm rambling, but
00:19:08
johngrimsmo
who
00:19:14
johngrimsmo
Yep.
00:19:16
johngrimsmo
And it's, I mean, that's the whole make-buy scenario we talk about a lot. We will continue to talk about for the rest of our lives.
00:19:20
John Saunders
right.
00:19:22
johngrimsmo
um And it always comes down to if if there is a solution out there that's already baked and that's already perfect and that is affordable, don't waste your time.
00:19:33
John Saunders
Yes.
00:19:33
johngrimsmo
just Just do it.
00:19:34
John Saunders
Exactly.
00:19:35
johngrimsmo
And it's like it's like, you know, when you spend money, especially if you have a little bit and you can like you can get away with buying the thing, I never regret it if the thing works.
00:19:35
John Saunders
Yes.
00:19:44
johngrimsmo
It's like, I don't regret spending the money to have this good tool.
00:19:46
John Saunders
Yes. Yeah.
00:19:47
johngrimsmo
and just I don't think about it. I just enjoy using the good tool. um Versus sometimes I'll try to you know save $400 and DIY it myself and 87 hours later, I'm like, I have a bad solution.
00:19:57
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:19:59
John Saunders
yeah Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Tool Life and Drilling Challenges
00:20:05
John Saunders
Sorry, like a ton thoughts going on my head, but they're all just saying the same thing again.
00:20:08
John Saunders
It's like, you know, before the Fidals and then Haas of the World came around, it was like, oh, you want to spend crazy big bucks for high-end machinery? And then there's a new layer that comes in and then below Haasas you get the Tormox, now below Tormox you get all these other, i mean there's prolific number of machines. It's interesting that none of that seems to have happened. I you got Wazer and water jets and certainly lots and more in the fab world, but you haven't seen the other stuff like nobody's doing the EVMs, nobody's doing, frankly there isn't as much happening Lays, which is a ah true tragedy as a guy who jokes about hating Lays,
00:20:08
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:20:42
John Saunders
that why aren't there five or 10 more sub $50,000 capable lays? Like it's, there's not this for Grindr. Sorry, i could go on, but you know what mean?
00:20:50
johngrimsmo
No, for sure. Yep.
00:20:53
John Saunders
Yeah. The only other thing that i can't get out of my head was one of the first ever auctions I went to when we were in the market for VMC. So this was probably eight or nine years ago. They had a Johnford Bridge Mill, um which I think Johnford's a Taiwanese kind of brand of some sorts.
00:21:07
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:21:08
John Saunders
And I looked up, walked up to it. I'm like, what the heck happened? Like what is going on? And I'm like, just naively had no idea. It was an EDM, what do you call Sync, like the mold, what he call the tooling?
00:21:21
johngrimsmo
Yeah, sinker.
00:21:21
John Saunders
and Yeah, it was like his full-time job was machining graphite for EDM machines. And so the thing was just an absolute mess.
00:21:27
johngrimsmo
Okay. Got it. Yeah, yeah. Machining graphite, hey, like I'm about to do today. Totally.
00:21:35
John Saunders
Well, if you're to a small part and you've got a vacuum or dust stuff on your, sorry.
00:21:39
johngrimsmo
Exactly. Yeah, we do, so Yeah, I briefly thought about ran running it like in the Speedio with coolant just to manage the dust. And then i remembered I remembered how porous graphite is and that this is going into a clean heat treat bag.
00:21:46
John Saunders
more
00:21:52
johngrimsmo
And you don't want ah you don't want the to put coolant into this graphite fixture because now it's going into a bag. That'd be bad.
00:22:02
John Saunders
Oh, my head went toward don't ruin your brother coolant.
00:22:07
johngrimsmo
Well, we've got really good filtration on the coolant, so I'm not actually worried about that. but But yeah, I'm not doing it. I'm doing it in the router, dry, vacuum.
00:22:15
John Saunders
Yes. Awesome.
00:22:16
johngrimsmo
Yep.
00:22:17
John Saunders
Cool.
00:22:19
John Saunders
um Yeah. I'm curious. i a warpi That is interesting.
00:22:24
johngrimsmo
Mm-hmm.
00:22:25
John Saunders
It's not a stress buildup.
00:22:26
johngrimsmo
Like, warping isn't really the right word. It's deformation. It's denting.
00:22:29
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:22:31
johngrimsmo
It's, uh, yeah.
00:22:33
John Saunders
Yeah. You don't think it stresses?
00:22:35
johngrimsmo
No, because these are localized dents.
00:22:35
John Saunders
Shouldn't you? Okay.
00:22:37
johngrimsmo
Like, I'll have to post a picture of one because it's like somebody took it took a little ball peen to it and just went ding.
00:22:39
John Saunders
Yeah. Yeah.
00:22:42
johngrimsmo
I'm like, what?
00:22:45
John Saunders
Yeah, that's really interesting.
00:22:46
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:22:48
John Saunders
Hmm. Um, well, okay. To borrow a phrase from the precision microcast, that's your precision problem, if you will.
00:22:57
johngrimsmo
Mmm.
00:22:58
John Saunders
Um, mine is, um we need to revisit tool life and steel, which is a big deal for us with fixture plates and it varies. And I'm pretty sure it's a simple answer, which is that the drills poke through the backside of the material, um, where there's still hot rolled scale.
00:23:19
John Saunders
Um, and so we're, Being, it's very much something I enjoy of just like, okay, well, let's break it down. Let's be formulaic. Like let's prove that that's what it is. So let's go take some extra steps to take two or three, four plates and go ahead and flip them to get the scale off the backside. Normally it's not the conducive to a good cycle time, but it's okay. Let's do that now.
00:23:20
johngrimsmo
okay
00:23:41
John Saunders
And then let's test and see if we immediately get a good result. I think we will, cause we actually already drill blind holes. same material same drill <unk> different size but same manufacturer etc so we it's a pretty it's a pretty logical answer but i've tried to keep an open mind
00:23:57
johngrimsmo
Is the drill tool life from poking through to the heat screw scale the problem?
00:24:01
John Saunders
yes yeah yeah i mean we're seeing a four-fold difference on what is probably our biggest tooling cost by double like it compared to anything else yeah exactly
00:24:02
johngrimsmo
OK.
00:24:05
johngrimsmo
Wow.
00:24:09
johngrimsmo
Wow. Like, inserted drills? Yep, yep.
00:24:14
John Saunders
Um, so then if that is the problem, then it's like, well, what do you do? And the best thought I have so far is there is obviously the mill scale gets milled off later. So you have some amount of additional stock there.
00:24:29
John Saunders
Um, it's only, going to guess 50 to a hundred thou maybe. So I think the answer will be just, again, you don't have to solve this perfectly on the first go. We have to just think of what's incrementally better. So.
00:24:43
John Saunders
the obvious and and obvious answer is to take that precision drill and have it not even poke through the scale, have stop a few thousand short or, um, you, you,
00:24:55
johngrimsmo
Yeah, I'm following.
00:24:56
John Saunders
Okay. Or you can have the tip poke through a little bit because the tips have not been the issue. It's the flanks or the, um, flanks.
00:25:01
johngrimsmo
Okay. The outer edges. Yeah.
00:25:03
John Saunders
Um, and then come back through probably with a, I call them U drills. It's like Sandvix is the 880 that lots of people make them, but it's the inserted, the drills that hold the little square inserts, um, and that are much tougher.
00:25:10
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:25:17
John Saunders
And basically you'd have that, you'd have that come through and it would wrap it down. to the remaining 70 thou of angular webbing left.
00:25:23
johngrimsmo
Yeah. yeah
00:25:26
John Saunders
And then you would have it blow through that. It could do it in a pretty crude manner. um Tool life should be way better. You can, but you're still then having to enter and exit every hole, which on a thousand holes, just, it just takes 15 to 40 minutes, depending on place size.
00:25:37
johngrimsmo
That's time.
00:25:40
johngrimsmo
Really.
00:25:40
John Saunders
on Oh yeah, big time. So that's not good long-term, but it could still be worth it. Maybe I could run the math on relative to the drill cost.
00:25:49
johngrimsmo
but
00:25:49
John Saunders
um What else? haven't thought of a better solution just yet.
00:25:54
johngrimsmo
And on this op, you're facing first and you're drilling into faced materials.
00:25:54
John Saunders
We'll figure it out.
00:25:59
johngrimsmo
It's not your entry that's the problem, obviously.
00:26:01
John Saunders
Correct. We get rid of the scale on the entry.
00:26:02
johngrimsmo
Yeah. Yeah, got it.
00:26:04
John Saunders
We also, the only reason we need it to be drilled through is that we then tap. We have always cut tap, but we might be able to, I'm talking out loud, we might be able to either form tap or go to a tap that's able to be
00:26:10
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:26:21
John Saunders
you know, bottoming and blind. um We're not, we're not thread knowing.
00:26:24
johngrimsmo
It
00:26:25
John Saunders
i appreciate it People will suggest that like for a million reasons and they're super just, yeah, long, inconsistent where, um you know cycle time, just not.
00:26:27
johngrimsmo
just takes too long.
00:26:30
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:26:33
johngrimsmo
Hmm.
00:26:35
John Saunders
um So, automat i mean,
00:26:37
johngrimsmo
Yeah, like I only treadmill. I don't rigid tap anything, but I don't do the volume that you guys do.
00:26:41
John Saunders
yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:26:44
johngrimsmo
So i just I'm just okay with it because I hate breaking taps.
00:26:48
John Saunders
I actually wish,
00:26:48
johngrimsmo
Love the YouTube channel. I hate the actual act of being Amish.
00:26:51
John Saunders
ah Touche. Great. ah Wow. A moment of silence for that one. Bottom meme style tap. This is good.
00:27:02
John Saunders
Thank you.
00:27:03
johngrimsmo
i wonder yeah I wonder if a bottoming tap is not as strong on the entry.
00:27:03
John Saunders
So just need to talk through this stuff.
00:27:09
johngrimsmo
Because you know like a taper tap is leads in a lot.
00:27:11
John Saunders
Sure.
00:27:12
johngrimsmo
I don't know.
00:27:14
John Saunders
We, well, the we use spiral. point which pushed the chip forward versus spiral flute because they were stronger tap intrinsically of a thicker core but um we can look into this i hate modifying tools i just why won't yes but we could form tap we do that aluminum form tapping uh 30 rockwell steel is no joke but our machine can could do it
00:27:21
johngrimsmo
Okay.
00:27:26
johngrimsmo
Yeah. It's just not a good process. Yeah.
00:27:38
johngrimsmo
That would get you bottoming, right?
00:27:41
John Saunders
yes tends to be much easier to get there
00:27:43
johngrimsmo
Might be worth experimenting.
00:27:45
John Saunders
what I wish existed. I've never heard of it. I can't think it does exist, but I wish we could thread mill. Well, actually, I don't know if I want this because it would add cycle time, but thread mill, but then come back and chase with a tap to ensure you don't end up with where, bingo.
00:28:05
johngrimsmo
undersized yeah
00:28:07
John Saunders
Yeah. But you can't sync up the threads. And again, it would, it would take too long.
00:28:13
johngrimsmo
yep yeah i mean form tapping was just like half 13 or something uh it's a pretty big high torque yeah
00:28:18
John Saunders
Yes.
00:28:21
John Saunders
That's a lot of torque, a lot horsepower. And actually at that point, you do have to factor in not so much power consumption of the spindle power, or electricity meter, but wear and tear.
00:28:31
John Saunders
And this start and stopping with huge amounts of torque is not something I want to do if I don't have to.
00:28:36
johngrimsmo
interesting um and the lesson i learned when i i tried form tapping 440 threads in titanium like with my tormac i guess it would have been um 14 13 you know 12 years ago or whatever um and i didn't know this at first but you need a bigger pre-hole to form tap
00:28:44
John Saunders
You need
00:28:58
John Saunders
a bigger pre-hole and the pre-hole size is very important.
00:29:01
johngrimsmo
Yes. Yeah. And I kept breaking these form taps because I i was on the smaller size hole.
00:29:03
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:29:06
johngrimsmo
It's like, ah, what the heck? And I literally go down the street to my local tooling rep and broke another one. I need, I need to buy two more. I can barely afford them.
00:29:14
John Saunders
okay
00:29:15
johngrimsmo
Like, how do I not break these?
00:29:15
John Saunders
This guy loves you.
00:29:17
johngrimsmo
And yeah. yeah And then I learned, it's like, oh, there's a chart for that. Yep.
00:29:23
John Saunders
Yeah, to be to be naive and... but We need more of that in this shot because then you become so...
00:29:28
johngrimsmo
Yep.
00:29:29
John Saunders
like You're like, i don't ever... for Well, yeah, but because 13 years ago on a Tormach, you had the wrong hole size. like That doesn't mean it's a bad...
00:29:33
johngrimsmo
yeah No, exactly. Yeah, no, absolutely. And then I know you have great success tapping thousands of holes a day, pretty much.
00:29:39
John Saunders
Yeah, right, right.
00:29:41
johngrimsmo
Because you've built a process around it. like
00:29:43
John Saunders
Yeah. Well, but we have a... I mean... the thing I was reflecting on before we hopped on this podcast was I have a, I still have a desire, even if it's like sort of oddly, um,
00:29:54
John Saunders
open and candid. I have so much desire to just share even the struggles. And like, this is this is ah good example of a failed process. Like, like nobody did anything wrong, but, but this has probably gone on too long, cost us too much, much money.
00:30:07
johngrimsmo
Exactly.
00:30:07
John Saunders
Like this is actually a, you could write a little case study and say, Hey, this is a pretty big miss by Saunders. Like you guys have been spending a lot of money, wasting time swapping out inserts, but that swapping out bodies.
00:30:17
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:30:18
John Saunders
Like this is something should have addressed sooner.
00:30:19
johngrimsmo
This is exactly.
00:30:21
John Saunders
I'm not to get hard on myself, but sorry,
00:30:22
johngrimsmo
Yeah, exactly what we talked about last week of like, you have ah process that is, it works and you know how to rework it and you know how to fix it and you know how to deal with all the problems.
00:30:30
John Saunders
right
00:30:32
johngrimsmo
um But if it were better, everybody would be happier.
00:30:35
John Saunders
Yeah. I guess to be more positive, it's also like, okay, but we're profitable.
00:30:39
johngrimsmo
Yeah,
00:30:40
John Saunders
We've, we, nothing's perfect. And now the best, most important thing is you're spending that time to go through and look at, Hey, where do we need to really improve stuff? Cause we you to quickly discovered is this is something we need to solve.
00:30:53
John Saunders
It's more important to solve this than to say shave 47 seconds off a chamfer operation on a VF2. Like we can do that later.
00:30:59
johngrimsmo
yeah. yeah
00:31:00
John Saunders
like
00:31:01
johngrimsmo
So what is the failure mode? Like the chips of the drill bit break, but what happens next? Like do you blow up taps? Do you stop the cycle or does it just make bad plates?
00:31:10
John Saunders
Nope, none of that. We have load limits on the machine. So it tells us, it tells us.
00:31:12
johngrimsmo
man
00:31:14
John Saunders
So we've got we've done good with we've gotten good at knowing, but like, let's let's push that let's push that out a little more.
00:31:16
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:31:20
johngrimsmo
Exactly. You have all your contingencies in place that catches the issue, but how do you eliminate the issue?
00:31:23
John Saunders
Right.
00:31:26
John Saunders
Bingo. And to be blunt, specifically here, because um we have cycle time limitation.
00:31:26
johngrimsmo
yeah
00:31:32
John Saunders
we We need that machine to be productive. So I don't want to slow things down. And um and those drills are really expensive.
00:31:40
johngrimsmo
So thinking about form tapping, say you don't drill through, you drill almost all the way through, you form tap as deep as you can to the bottom of the drill what lead, whatever it's called, the tip.
00:31:45
John Saunders
yep
00:31:53
John Saunders
hu
00:31:53
johngrimsmo
um Is your hole going to be half 13 perfect all the way down the thread? Or does the form tap like to go through and come back to get the same thread pitch evenly?
00:32:05
John Saunders
you're
00:32:05
johngrimsmo
You know what i man I don't know.
00:32:07
John Saunders
To be honest, no, I don't know what you mean. It should be fine though.
00:32:10
johngrimsmo
Okay.
00:32:10
John Saunders
you You can form tap in a blind hole up to, I mean, I wouldn't go closer than 10 thou, but you could probably go three or four thou.
00:32:17
johngrimsmo
i
00:32:17
John Saunders
um
00:32:18
johngrimsmo
From the bottom, you mean?
00:32:20
John Saunders
Yes.
00:32:21
johngrimsmo
But is my, my question is, and maybe I'm being too specific here, but is the perfect is is the exact thread pitch the same from top of the hole to the bottom of the hole where it's blind at the bottom?
00:32:21
John Saunders
Bottom being the highest point of the drill angle. but yeah
00:32:34
johngrimsmo
Because the top of the hole is cut by the first part of the tap and the second part of the tap and all the way down the tap.
00:32:34
John Saunders
All right. Yeah.
00:32:40
johngrimsmo
I don't know if I'm explaining that.
00:32:40
John Saunders
yeah No, you're you're actually you're explaining it very well. the Basically, the the top of the hole has multiple spring passes vis-a-vis vis-a-vis the additional rotation.
00:32:47
johngrimsmo
Yeah. Yeah. Naturally.
00:32:51
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:32:51
John Saunders
I actually, to be fair, can't answer that.
00:32:53
johngrimsmo
Of course. Yeah.
00:32:54
John Saunders
But we form tap all of the M5 steel holes in our mod vices. And the Tap goes through, but you still the bottom most threads still haven't been chased as much in your example here.
00:33:11
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:33:11
John Saunders
And and they're fine.
00:33:12
John Saunders
so
00:33:12
johngrimsmo
i'm I'm sure that thread tolerance is accounts for all this and just is is fine.
00:33:16
johngrimsmo
Not an issue, but.
00:33:19
John Saunders
Formtaps are oddly good even in steel. there like they The problem that we have on the mod vices is that the formtap doesn't wear.
00:33:26
johngrimsmo
That's what was wondering. Yeah.
00:33:28
John Saunders
And this is in 4140 as well, although not 30 Rockwell, but they last so long. Now, luckily, the M5 form taps are quite inexpensive. So I believe that's one of those tools that for, you know, $10, we just replace it every six weeks regardless.
00:33:44
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:33:45
John Saunders
um Even if we haven't, for some reason, run them that much, which we do, it's just not worth trying to track it.
00:33:51
johngrimsmo
That's good to know. That's a huge form tap endorsement there.
00:33:56
John Saunders
Yeah, you don't need it in seal to be honest, but it helps with chip control.
00:34:02
johngrimsmo
Yeah, for sure. Yeah, because how how is your chip control doing plates tapping?
00:34:04
John Saunders
That's the reason I like
00:34:11
John Saunders
It's not, that's actually a really good question. I need to, I should ask Kayla cause I don't, I used to remember how is chip control?
00:34:23
John Saunders
um I'm blanking on what we did, and but I think it's better because I do remember I used to sometimes walk up and see you'd have, um you have oh, we must use spiral.
00:34:36
John Saunders
I must be wrong, John. We must use spiral flutes that pull the chip up.
00:34:39
johngrimsmo
instead of straight flutes. yeah Okay.
00:34:41
John Saunders
Yeah, because when you we were when we were using the ones that push them forward, the plates are machined with risers. that there There's a gap below them, of course. And you would just end up packing these chips underneath there.
00:34:54
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:34:54
John Saunders
And it was just a mess.
00:34:58
John Saunders
So if using spiral flute already, then I bet you there is maybe a potential for a bottoming style tap that could get us there. Let me think about that.
00:35:07
johngrimsmo
I like, a I'm curious to hear results on form tapping if you can can do that.
00:35:13
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:35:14
johngrimsmo
I guess you'd need a different drill. like
00:35:17
John Saunders
So that's, yeah. What we would do is interpolate for now because fine yeah.
00:35:20
johngrimsmo
Sure, it would prove the experiment, yeah, totally.
00:35:23
John Saunders
and then last time we talked to a tour rep about it, they really wanted us to do form taps with through coolant, which actually does well.
00:35:28
johngrimsmo
Yeah, because you have a blind hole now.
00:35:31
John Saunders
Oh, actually touche blind hole, but also the way you're form tap, it's, it's literally like a 14 process.
00:35:37
John Saunders
So you really do want the coolant as a lubricant. And if you have it shooting radially out the side of the form tap, it's going to push. It's going to go exactly where you want it. And the lubricity matters lot more than a cut tap.
00:35:37
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:35:48
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:35:50
John Saunders
I don't want to do this on the spindle though.
00:35:54
johngrimsmo
What the higher load?
00:35:55
John Saunders
Yeah. In the back and forth. I really don't want to.
00:35:58
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:36:01
John Saunders
And you don't need, that's saying you don't, it doesn't make the product better empirically like, or materially.
00:36:05
johngrimsmo
I'd be curious to see to see load values of cut tap versus form tap.
00:36:09
John Saunders
Oh, it's big deal.
00:36:10
johngrimsmo
Is it? Yeah.
00:36:11
John Saunders
Oh yeah. Yeah. You can run it. Well, here's the point. You can run a cut, a half 13 cut tap with a regular 12 inch tap handle. Like you're, you're twisting it hand.
00:36:24
John Saunders
Um, we have tried that to form tap the rest of a hole with a, with a form tap and a big thing. You're not touching it.
00:36:33
johngrimsmo
The rest of a whole.
00:36:34
John Saunders
So like, well, you you can't really start a hole with the form tap.
00:36:37
johngrimsmo
No, but now your pre-hole is too small.
00:36:38
John Saunders
Um,
00:36:40
John Saunders
No, no, no. So let's say we have a correct, we have a correct sized hole. We form tap half of it and then we take out the machine. So you have the last, last half is not form tapped.
00:36:51
johngrimsmo
ah Okay.
00:36:52
John Saunders
If you want to, if you want to tap the rest of that from memory, you, there was no, you weren't touching that.
00:36:52
johngrimsmo
yeah Okay.
00:36:57
johngrimsmo
Interesting. Interesting.
00:37:01
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:37:02
johngrimsmo
I guess you'd see it on the load meter on the spindle. Like if you've tried it, you ran the experiment.
00:37:07
John Saunders
yeah We can calculate it The data's out there too.
00:37:09
johngrimsmo
Yeah, interesting.
00:37:13
John Saunders
I'm laughing because before we John and I hit record, we're like, we don't have a ton today. and We're 37 minutes in and we haven't moved beyond heat
00:37:19
johngrimsmo
Talk about tapping.
00:37:22
John Saunders
deaf or he treat whatever.
00:37:24
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:37:25
John Saunders
Are you nervous about machining the graphite?
00:37:27
johngrimsmo
No, not at all.
00:37:28
John Saunders
Are you going to get new tooling
AI in Machining and Toolpath Solutions
00:37:30
John Saunders
or just use?
00:37:30
johngrimsmo
I pulled a tool out of my scrap bin. I don't care.
00:37:33
John Saunders
Oh, you don't think it'll just shatter?
00:37:35
johngrimsmo
No, not at all. It's it's pencil lead. It's like super soft.
00:37:38
John Saunders
Oh, yeah. Yeah.
00:37:39
johngrimsmo
it's I always and don't even think it's abrasive. like We use graphite lubricant. like it's in i I think the worry of using it in the CNC machine and having it ruin your CNC machine is not that it's abrasive.
00:37:46
John Saunders
yeah Okay. Yeah, right.
00:37:54
johngrimsmo
It's that the dust will get into your electronics and that's bad.
00:37:58
John Saunders
Interesting. Okay.
00:37:59
johngrimsmo
um So I don't even think it's like... a but I'm not sure about this. Like, is the dust bad for your ball screws? Is bad for like the machine, the sliding surfaces, or is it actually kind of lubricitous and not that bad? I don't know.
00:38:13
John Saunders
i don't think it's still I don't think you want to pour some graphite dust on your trucks and see if they slide better.
00:38:15
johngrimsmo
i agree, but...
00:38:20
johngrimsmo
Yeah, it's but don't I don't know. But I've got Delsa filtration on like sucker um on the router, so it'll be fine.
00:38:26
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:38:29
johngrimsmo
And then i was I was infusion, I pulled in a tool, you know, from the current tool library, because that's the same end mill I pulled out. And I put it into the the file and the cam file for this the router. And I'm like, what speeds and feeds am I using for graphite?
00:38:44
johngrimsmo
I don't care stainless.
00:38:44
John Saunders
All of them.
00:38:45
John Saunders
Yeah, right. Is it a really simple part or is it...
00:38:45
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:38:48
johngrimsmo
Yeah, it's, it's, uh, I'm interpolating a little head and then I'm boring a hole like a 0.150 hole.
00:38:57
John Saunders
i'm I am deliberately changing the subject. The next time you have a part like that, maybe a little bit more complicated, can i ask you a favor?
00:39:03
johngrimsmo
Huh? Toolpath it.
00:39:06
John Saunders
Will you send it to me and let me show you...
00:39:07
johngrimsmo
Interesting. I still send it to you.
00:39:08
John Saunders
Or you can do it yourself, I guess, but send it to me.
00:39:10
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:39:10
John Saunders
Let me show you what it can do because I want to see... I think my thesis here would be if you don't see the value, I'm not saying you should subscribe to it because I don't care if you subscribe, but I, I care because you've been, we've been on the journey together.
00:39:18
johngrimsmo
No, it's a good question.
00:39:24
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:39:24
John Saunders
If you see that and you're like, eh, then I think we've missed something. If you see that and you go Oh wow. Okay. Even if it's a teaching aid to help your other guys learn fusion better, like there's all these reasons that can justify it, but I just want to know your, I know we're doing this publicly and there's a,
00:39:33
johngrimsmo
Yeah, yeah. Interesting.
00:39:39
johngrimsmo
Yeah, yeah.
00:39:40
John Saunders
undertones of publicity, but like, um I actually want to don't see you look at this
00:39:45
johngrimsmo
Well, i I programmed this last night, like before bed. And I probably spent, I spent more time, you know, figuring out how i'm going to hold it and drag the vice model in and find where's my origin on this router.
00:39:56
John Saunders
Yeah, right, right.
00:39:59
johngrimsmo
I can't remember. Oh, um I spent more time screwing around with that.
00:40:01
John Saunders
Great.
00:40:04
johngrimsmo
But actually programming it, it did take probably 10 plus minutes of, even though it's a relatively easy part.
00:40:11
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:40:11
johngrimsmo
I still like, ah, do I want this? Do I want that? It's, you know, Whereas this sounds way easier in toolpath.
00:40:15
John Saunders
And
00:40:19
John Saunders
now to be fair or to share part of the experience I've gone through, you and I are opinionated people that have been doing this for 10 plus years.
00:40:25
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:40:26
John Saunders
You might see it and start judging it. Um, I, what I've had to realize and learn is that anytime you have somebody else program your parts, a consultant, an intern, a new hire, et cetera, even myself on a tired night, like,
00:40:39
johngrimsmo
Yeah, yeah.
00:40:42
John Saunders
There's a lot of different ways to do it. So you have to have a little bit more of an open, and I'm not saying it doesn't create, it's doing floors and horizontal or faces. And um I can't think of the new toolpath that does floors.
00:40:53
johngrimsmo
floor isn't it yeah
00:40:53
John Saunders
What's the new? Yeah. Isn't it floor? like But um I remembered like you, it's flat. That's the toolpath.
00:41:03
John Saunders
um
00:41:03
johngrimsmo
oh yeah i totally that's why we use simulation and be like oh i missed that corner okay of course
00:41:04
John Saunders
It does. ah Yeah. There's still things that I'll miss every now and then as do I miss stuff. and you gets so Right.
00:41:14
John Saunders
My point being, if if you expect toolpath to just like mimic clone you, it's not, is it going to program the part logically? 90 some percent of the time. Yes.
00:41:23
johngrimsmo
Interesting. Fascinating. And then I guess the theory is you build your tool library, you build your fixturing standards, right?
00:41:35
johngrimsmo
And that saves a lot of time because you've now standardized a lot of stuff.
00:41:35
John Saunders
Um,
00:41:39
John Saunders
Interesting question. Yes, tooling is for sure a quirkier thing long-term how to kind of sync to let Toolpath know what you have or want to use.
00:41:51
John Saunders
um and don't want to spend a ton of time on this because I feel like it's too salesy, but the quick answer is Toolpath has done a really good job at pulling in whatever Fusion tools and libraries that you want. Then what's really nice is you can say priority, second tier and third tier. And the reason you would do that is priorities, probably what's in your tool changer.
00:42:09
John Saunders
Second tier might be what you have in the drawer next to the machine. Third tier might be like stuff that you're willing to order or you bought in the past, but maybe you'd rather not unless you really need it. Then the really, really cool thing that is mind blowing, although they need to do a little bit of a better job at integrating, like telling you about it is the tool recommendation engine. So if you have a weird part like this three,
00:42:31
John Saunders
300% 3d print mockup of a part and you don't, uh, right.
00:42:34
johngrimsmo
Nice. but
00:42:36
John Saunders
You don't know how to machine this area. It will scrape tool tool path. We'll use the blower AI intelligence and it will look through whatever libraries you're willing to let it to Harvey helical, uh, Canon, there have to be libraries that have been integrated, but, and it will tell you tools that can accomplish that task, which is in phenomenal, like in insane.
00:42:51
johngrimsmo
It's great. already Yeah.
00:42:55
johngrimsmo
Nice.
00:42:58
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:43:00
John Saunders
Um, I think back to, we're not a job shop, but I think back to the parts we did for the Apollo 50 with this Sisonian Adam Savage. And we'd make all these five access parts for this Apollo door.
00:43:11
John Saunders
And I basically was like, I just need to, I need you to give me a list of like 15 tools to buy. I don't care. I don't, I'm not going to own these. I just need to know.
00:43:17
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:43:17
John Saunders
It took me two days to go through and find tools. Whereas this would just done it in five minutes.
00:43:21
johngrimsmo
And that's every job shop for every job sometimes, right?
00:43:24
John Saunders
Right.
00:43:26
johngrimsmo
Cool.
00:43:27
John Saunders
Um, I wanted to ask you one thing, but you can defer if you have other stuff to go over, but what the heck is Kern releasing?
00:43:34
johngrimsmo
I can't tell you that.
00:43:35
John Saunders
Okay.
00:43:36
johngrimsmo
I don't actually know.
00:43:37
John Saunders
Okay.
00:43:37
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:43:38
John Saunders
They haven't talked about it yet?
00:43:39
johngrimsmo
No. um Yeah, there was some announcement on the 15th that I didn't see.
00:43:42
John Saunders
Okay. Okay.
00:43:44
johngrimsmo
i don't know.
00:43:45
John Saunders
Okay.
00:43:45
John Saunders
Yeah. Yeah, right.
00:43:45
johngrimsmo
Yeah, but I'm curious.
00:43:47
johngrimsmo
yep They have their open house in Chicago next Thursday, Friday, which I'm 50-50 going to go to.
00:43:52
John Saunders
yeah
00:43:55
johngrimsmo
um we'll We'll see how the first week of school is for the kids. and See if I can get away for the last two days.
00:43:58
John Saunders
yeah Yeah. Speaking of 500% 3D prints, there's a Torx 400.
00:44:05
johngrimsmo
Oh, that is amazing.
00:44:09
John Saunders
yeah It works
Manufacturing Management and Oversight
00:44:10
John Saunders
great, right?
00:44:10
johngrimsmo
yeah
00:44:10
John Saunders
It's like, it's so perfect to start to interrogate and understand how, how tooling is going to interact and read in and what want it to do?
00:44:14
johngrimsmo
Oh, that's cool.
00:44:18
johngrimsmo
And how the part, yes. I love it. Please use that in your marketing demos. When you start selling that product, that's a good thing.
00:44:23
John Saunders
oh that's a good point.
00:44:26
johngrimsmo
Like even just seeing a glimpse of it.
00:44:27
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:44:29
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:44:29
johngrimsmo
I'm like, I get it now.
00:44:30
johngrimsmo
Okay. No, no, uh, 3d animations here.
00:44:32
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:44:35
johngrimsmo
You want like, I want to see your face with a 500% model.
00:44:39
John Saunders
Yeah. Yeah. This is, this is it. Um, yeah, we're doing anything we can to mill it instead of turn it, which is of course a terrible answer because ultimately long-term will we'll turn that.
00:44:46
johngrimsmo
okay
00:44:50
johngrimsmo
Yeah, but
00:44:51
John Saunders
I don't want to spend a thousand dollars on a Willemann boring bar holder that will hold the tools that get in there.
00:44:57
johngrimsmo
although not to test.
00:44:58
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:45:00
John Saunders
but We don't need it now.
00:45:01
John Saunders
We, we yeah.
00:45:01
johngrimsmo
Yeah, exactly.
00:45:02
johngrimsmo
Exactly.
00:45:05
johngrimsmo
Yeah. So what are you up to for it today?
00:45:08
John Saunders
um I,
00:45:12
John Saunders
the other thing I'm, well, what am I to do today? We were almost the other day. Oh, we made a bunch of, can share this, I think. We made a bunch of Johnny Five neck cups on the Willemann for the group of folks that are doing builds.
00:45:26
johngrimsmo
Oh, cool.
00:45:26
John Saunders
So perfect Willemann part. It is a um tapered angled aluminum part with a hemisphere in there that accepts a it accepts a nylon ball for the head joint.
00:45:39
johngrimsmo
Okay.
00:45:39
John Saunders
so And that has an angled hole in it. It has a threaded ring. And then a mating ring that has a hemisphere made in its bingo.
00:45:46
johngrimsmo
That holds the ball. Yeah. Yeah.
00:45:49
John Saunders
Yeah. um So we ran a hundred of them and it's like super fun. um You know, again we're not a job shop, but it was fun here to like, you know, play play a role in that.
00:45:56
johngrimsmo
Yeah. yeah
00:45:57
John Saunders
um So got to ship those out. um
00:46:00
johngrimsmo
That's really cool.
00:46:00
John Saunders
And then I'll leave this.
00:46:02
johngrimsmo
that what
00:46:02
John Saunders
Okay.
00:46:03
johngrimsmo
On that note, it's funny because Claire has been for all for many years now obsessed with ball-jointed dolls.
00:46:09
John Saunders
Okay.
00:46:09
John Saunders
Oh yeah.
00:46:09
johngrimsmo
So she like she likes making her own dolls and she's currently making a one totally from clay and she's hand making the ball joints and the mating receiver and and she's gonna string like rubber through all the all the limbs and stuff.
00:46:18
John Saunders
Okay.
00:46:23
John Saunders
Yeah, yeah.
00:46:24
johngrimsmo
um But seeing how you're making the ball jointed thing and I'm like, Claire just did that in clay. like
00:46:28
John Saunders
It's awesome. Yeah, yeah. Does she fire him in your heat treat oven?
00:46:32
johngrimsmo
No, in the oven at home. but
00:46:33
John Saunders
Stop.
00:46:34
johngrimsmo
Yeah, for sure.
00:46:35
John Saunders
I thought Clay had to be like, ah, okay.
00:46:36
johngrimsmo
It's a certain kind of clay. It's like not not crazy. It's like baking cookies, but yeah.
00:46:41
John Saunders
Is that right? I remember back in New York days when I had to buy a Black & Decker toaster because I'm like, if I powder coat in my apartment oven, I'm going to get shot.
00:46:49
johngrimsmo
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
00:46:53
John Saunders
Um, no, here's something that, um, if you want to talk about it more next week, I'd love to, if you don't find it boring, that's fine. Um, as I succeed in recusing myself from lots of ongoing things there, what is the right answer to creating, and you can use the word report, uh, update, memorialized wiki, like there's all so different ways you could say this thing.
00:47:18
John Saunders
Um, to as to whether or not a ladder, not going use like business to terms. I don't mean to, but I think it just works well to whether a lateral person on the same team or a superior,
00:47:30
John Saunders
ah e me or somebody else, a manager can then review that.
00:47:34
John Saunders
So for example, we had a weird situation where we had a, International shipment that had some damage. Stinks, but it happens. um And the customer was vocal about how the replacement was shipped regarding VAT.
00:47:34
johngrimsmo
Hmm.
00:47:51
John Saunders
and we um i wanted if we ship that differently than we've ever shipped that before my gut reaction and i do ah i do sometimes kind of overreact but my reaction was like hey that should be something where and i'm going to just make this up on the spot every week whoever's the manager of that department should be able to review and say oh on tuesday somebody shipped something and they did something they've never done before let's just look and see is that what we want to do going forward because i don't want to
00:48:17
johngrimsmo
yeah
00:48:18
John Saunders
ah I know it'll be detrimental if you sit there undermine and say, oh, I need to know, and like tell me on the spot, but like on the flip side, stuff can't always happen in a vacuum.
00:48:27
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:48:28
John Saunders
Sorry, we'll leave it at that.
00:48:28
johngrimsmo
Yeah. and And you don't want to be reactive to every situation like, oh, ill ship it this way this time. And you need somebody overseeing that and making the calls. Like, it's okay to make that decision. Let's not make it every time, you know, somebody to do that.
00:48:40
John Saunders
Yeah. Yeah.
00:48:41
johngrimsmo
um No, i don't have an answer for you, but yeah.
00:48:45
John Saunders
but so Let's talk about more of you on mine next week.
00:48:46
johngrimsmo
Yeah, no, I like that because we've been, we've been talking about more stuff like that here too.
00:48:47
John Saunders
Okay.
00:48:50
johngrimsmo
Um, and that's the whole, uh, you know, process plan manager, it's it's like a whole job that none of us really want to do, but we all need it.
00:48:55
John Saunders
Yeah. with
00:49:00
John Saunders
So it's very interesting. You just said that I, for a lot of this week, I've been thinking about this and I felt guilty about wanting this. And then because we're, lookre it's like seven of us here. It's not like we have laterals and superiors.
00:49:12
John Saunders
It's like me and like everybody has autonomy.
00:49:14
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:49:14
John Saunders
but But it also reminds me back to the advice from, um, what's the book, uh, the cookie baking cookies, entrepreneurship book.
00:49:23
johngrimsmo
Ooh. Oh, I don't know.
00:49:25
John Saunders
Is it even if?
00:49:26
johngrimsmo
E-Myth with the pie baking lady.
00:49:27
John Saunders
Yes. but it Yes. Yes.
00:49:30
johngrimsmo
Yeah. Yeah.
00:49:30
John Saunders
When it's like, even when you're your own single employee, make an org chart.
00:49:34
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:49:35
John Saunders
and it's kind of like, that's what I'm thinking here. Even though it's really a flat team and all that. Yeah. Like let's start putting together some basic, hate to use word report, but like updates of like, Hey, here's three things I did this week that were unusual and we can review them.
00:49:47
John Saunders
um I don't care if we made a mistake or we should have done it differently, but we got to have a chance to talk about that.
00:49:52
johngrimsmo
Yeah, exactly. And it's more, it's not so much for hierarchy, it's more for responsibilities. um You break in your company into departments and heads and ah who is accountable to who ah they call it the accountability chart, at least in the traction book they do.
00:50:00
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:50:03
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:50:07
johngrimsmo
Yeah,
00:50:08
John Saunders
Oh, that, Gina. I've never read that.
00:50:10
johngrimsmo
yeah I quite like it.
00:50:11
John Saunders
I should read it, huh?
00:50:12
johngrimsmo
um
00:50:13
John Saunders
Reporting.
00:50:15
johngrimsmo
But yeah, it looks like an org chart, except it's who's responsible for what, as opposed to ah you work for me and you work for you and you work for you. It's org charts always
Project Updates: Johnny Five and Argon Purge Station
00:50:25
johngrimsmo
felt kind of hierarchy, which we've tried to avoid for so many years, but the accountability chart kind of really helped.
00:50:32
John Saunders
Well, but so that's, and you can say uncle, if you want to stop talking about this, but that's not what happened here. I'll make up an example. I'll, in your world let's just say you have a new employee joe or in ah joe joe's been around for a year but he goes to ship a product on tuesday and he ends up the customer requests a different form through your dhl whatever and he's like yeah i'll do that like i don't there's not something i'm going to bother john about john has told me to do my job have autonomy there's no like crazy like we're not like lying or exposing us to a crazy risk but like at the end of the week he's like hey we shipped all these orders this week just as a quick heads up everything went fine the only i wanted to mention to you was that
00:50:54
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:50:58
johngrimsmo
Sure.
00:51:10
John Saunders
Whatever. We had one that got delayed, and then we had one where I had to do a new form we've never done before.
00:51:12
johngrimsmo
Mm-hmm.
00:51:16
John Saunders
Like, that's kind of what I think I want.
00:51:18
johngrimsmo
Yeah, you're just putting a system in place where anything outside of the ordinary, even the ordinary, but lump it into, you know, 52 good packages went out, three weird.
00:51:21
John Saunders
Yes.
00:51:27
johngrimsmo
um I think we, I think our team is tight enough that our managers
00:51:29
John Saunders
Because what if... but
00:51:34
johngrimsmo
ah know what's going on, because there is enough communication back and forth. And I think our teams know anything weird gets brought up immediately.
00:51:43
John Saunders
Is that what, yeah, we don't have that, I guess. And I'm, I'm not upset we don't have that because i don't want to have that everybody say, oh, anytime there's something i'm sure, we just go ask John or whatever.
00:51:48
johngrimsmo
Sure.
00:51:51
johngrimsmo
Yeah. Yeah. Which is distracting. I will admit.
00:51:54
John Saunders
And the the thing I'm laughing is that like, especially in these weird edge case things like HS codes or tariffs or shipping requests, it's like, no, what if four years ago we dealt with this, but like somebody doesn't know, but I happen to remember or or whatever.
00:52:07
johngrimsmo
Yeah. Then you have tribal tribal knowledge and you're not.
00:52:08
John Saunders
Or it's,
00:52:11
johngrimsmo
Yeah.
00:52:12
John Saunders
but Sorry, I've been talking too much.
00:52:13
John Saunders
What are you up to today?
00:52:13
johngrimsmo
No, it's good.
00:52:14
johngrimsmo
Um, I'm going to machine the graphite and then finish this argon purge station.
00:52:20
John Saunders
Nice.
00:52:23
johngrimsmo
I needed a way to get the nozzle with a little ball valve like 10 plus inches off the table so I could fit the bag underneath. And I'm like, I guess I'll have to do two prints to get it 10 plus inches.
00:52:31
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:52:35
johngrimsmo
um But then I got to print a whole base. so So I walked to the heat treat cell and I saw they have an indicator stand, which I probably bought from you for $5 at your open house.
00:52:43
John Saunders
ha Yes. yeah
00:52:45
johngrimsmo
a granite base that's little like like six by six or something with no with a metal rod coming out the back
00:52:48
John Saunders
With the hole in it? yeah Yes, there are those.
00:52:52
johngrimsmo
Yeah, yeah. And so we're using it with an indicator to measure bow on parts before they go into to heat read and we're tracking warp through the part. But there's this whole, you know, four inches of metal rod sticking out the top that's not getting used that happens to go pretty high off the table.
00:53:08
johngrimsmo
So I designed this print that literally slips onto the top of that indicator base, moves over five inches away from the base, and then has the nozzle on top.
00:53:13
John Saunders
Nice.
00:53:18
johngrimsmo
And I'm like, oh yeah, that's pretty sick.
00:53:20
John Saunders
so Sweet.
00:53:22
johngrimsmo
so I'm going finalize that and then our Argon purge station will be complete for now.
00:53:23
John Saunders
That's also meant to tell you, uh, we bought a gorilla and it's here and I, I grill a fab the sand.
00:53:27
johngrimsmo
Rev 1.
00:53:35
johngrimsmo
the The indicator stand.
00:53:36
John Saunders
Yeah.
00:53:36
johngrimsmo
here
00:53:37
John Saunders
Um, And I like it, but there's some things I wanted to ask you or talk about. So maybe next week too.
00:53:42
John Saunders
Okay. So I'll see you. All right.
00:53:42
johngrimsmo
Okay, sounds good, man.
00:53:45
johngrimsmo
so it's good tipp but