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Business of Machining - Episode 21
194 Plays8 years ago
Pierson Tour: http://bit.ly/2tk4c4w
Grimsmo Knives work-flow boards: http://bit.ly/2slM8T6
Pierson QC Review video: http://bit.ly/2slWfab "Goals are tools that allow me to say no"--What does that even mean? On this episode of Business of Machining, Grimsmo and Saunders are taking action to improve workflow processes and quality control. While Grimsmo visits a machine shop at a local college, SMW hosts a TIG Welding class with Roy Crumrine and Jonathan Lewis (WELDING TIPS AND TRICKS PODCAST). Grimsmo shares an Instagram photo that strikes Saunders in a profound way. Pictures are STILL worth a thousand words--and shows that inspiration and perspective can be cultivated from anywhere! Saunders adds another new member to the team with a focus on Arduino and automation and Grimsmo gets a few new suggestions for a chip load issue on the lathe.
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Transcript
Introduction to Episode 21
00:00:00
Speaker
Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the Business of Machining, episode 21. I am John Rimsmo. My name is John Saunders. And good morning, my friend. How are you? Pretty good. I was weak. Been a busy, really awesome week. Yeah?
Touring Woodshop and Machine Shop Visits
00:00:18
Speaker
Yeah. I think I told you last Friday, this Monday, we went to the local college and got to tour. We have friends with the woodshop teacher.
00:00:27
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Yeah, so we got to tour his whole facility. It's like I'm not a woodworking guy in the slightest, but I mean, he had an awesome shop. And like every single station has a dust collector into this gigantic tube in the ceiling. And it was really impressive. That's cool. And he said he can teach up to three classes in the facility at the same time. So just imagining like all those bodies in there on each machine. It was pretty sweet. And then he walked us over to the machine shop, too, which I'd seen through the windows before, but I'd never actually like gone inside.
00:00:57
Speaker
And there's probably 50 manual lathes all lined up at an angle, like really cool setup. And then a bunch of Haas TL1s and TM1s. And then a brand new Robo drill right in the middle. I think it was a four axis Robo drill.
Potential Internships with Local Students
00:01:15
Speaker
Just got plugged in right in the middle. So I mean, it's kind of funny because this big giant machine shop and kind of the only thing I'm interested in is the Robo drill.
00:01:22
Speaker
Right, right, right. But I didn't get to meet the teacher because he was teaching a class. But I'll get to meet him. The woodshop guy and him are going to come by our shop soon. Is building a relationship with that teacher a potential for you to have somebody come do a test trial internship? For the students, yeah, absolutely. That's awesome. Yeah, yeah. So having the direct connection is going to be super cool.
Dynamic Work Environment in Saunders' Shop
00:01:47
Speaker
It's funny you talk about three classes at once.
00:01:51
Speaker
the awesomest week in the sense that, so we had this, was it last week? Yeah, the Richard King scraping class, which I sort of like half took. I was working on the grinder during it with the students and Richard King. And then the shop was kind of running as usual. And then this Monday, Ed started who's our Arduino and automation intern working on those sort of projects, which has been awesome this week. And
00:02:15
Speaker
We're starting our first TIG welding class today, which is Roy Krumrhein and Jonathan Lewis. These are the guys that do the Welding Tips and Tricks podcast, which is awesome. And those guys are good TIG welders and also good teachers, which I'm excited about. So Jonathan arrived last night. We were here late setting up all the tables and got all the hoods laid out. It looks really nice, but this week was
00:02:39
Speaker
I just can't ever, it's just not my style to ever stop and look at things and be like, yeah, pat yourself on the back. But this week was one of the first weeks where I was like, holy cow. I've got Ed working on Arduino projects. Zach is our summer high school intern. He's doing great. Noah was Zach last year and he was working full time now. He's doing great. Jared's business as usual. It's just this energy and it's this ship which I'm steering, but I no longer have to be
00:03:10
Speaker
This company is more than me, and I feel like that's starting to be empirically true beyond my opinion. That is utterly amazing. Yeah, it is cool. Now, that doesn't make it easy. I still got to steer the ship. You've got to say, hey, this is the focus we need to be on, or this is good or bad, or how do you handle QC, workflow, I mean, don't get me wrong, it's like a whole new set of problems, but it's awesome. Yeah.
00:03:32
Speaker
man, that's, that's the goal right there. Like once you get past the individual stage of this is my business and I do everything and you know, this is the work we're doing, but you're growing past that here. You've got people doing what you need them to do so that you can work on higher level stuff.
Critique of SPCS Acronym
00:03:47
Speaker
Right. I talked to, you sent me that Instagram photo of the guy who had the Kurt Vice on top of the palette that was on the Pearson Speed Change palettes. System.
00:03:59
Speaker
Yeah, pallet system, thank you. That might be my one severe criticism of Pearson is that is the worst acronym ever, SPCS. S-C-P-E-S. I called the company and I was like, hey, you don't know me from Adam, but machinist and fan of what you're doing.
00:04:19
Speaker
Based on that photo and if whoever took that photo has five minutes I'd love to pick their brain about their experience of putting a vice on top of a pallet system Which if you if anyone's listening didn't listen last
Balancing Work and Personal Life
00:04:31
Speaker
week I had this awesome idea doing that debate or downside is you've got like $4,000 in work holding which is which is not good, but nevertheless I think the real issue the real priority is the Pearson
00:04:46
Speaker
And then it's just a question of if I need a vice, maybe it's one I already own instead of buying a new dedicated orange or something. Or like I said, a small vice or a Wilton-Camlock vice, et cetera. Anyways, talk to this guy. Really good information. He's been super happy with them. They're repeating. They're still new. But what was really cool, a former IT guy.
00:05:06
Speaker
Started machining five years ago. They've got three employees. They're doing very well and He also talked about his business in a way That reminded me of what I'm striving for I think you're striving for and then certainly what Pearson I think is his imparted which is it's kind of him and his guys and he comes in and The guys run the machines and there's workflow and there's process and there's inventory and they don't over produce because they know The firearm industry changes so rapidly. They don't want a lot of bad inventory on hand or stale
00:05:36
Speaker
But he's like, yeah, I get the guy set up, I may do a few hours of work, I go home, I see the kids, I do other stuff, I may come back. And he had a totally different, like he wasn't that like, I need to hustle from 5.30 in the morning till 10 p.m. at night to make ends meet. Which is, even if literally that might not be the case with us, that's how we feel.
00:06:00
Speaker
Yeah, now I won't counter that in saying this week also I think proves to me that I love what I'm doing for me, which is for a year or two,
Growth and Teamwork at Saunders' Company
00:06:11
Speaker
I did too much. I took on too much, but I did it because we're not just a product-based company. We do our fixture plates for the tour box, we do our videos, we do other products, we do job shop, we do training, which is a lot, maybe too much.
00:06:24
Speaker
I've got someone helping me basically full-time with the training. I've got someone now working on the Arduino. I've got Julia helping with the videos. All of a sudden, I've worked too hard to build it into something that's too big for one person, and now I'm starting to push that out, and it's knock on wood, it's working. Absolutely, yeah. Man, all that from just seeing a picture on the internet that I sent you, and then you get this amazing perspective from, I didn't expect that, that you'd go that deep. Like, that's amazing.
00:06:51
Speaker
Well, I wanted to call the guy. And he did share the one potential weakness of that system is if you're going to do the orange vices, like a lot of screw vices can hold potentially 10,000 pounds of clamping pressure. So if you're taking a max 20, 30 horsepower cut in a block of 30 Rockwell 41, 40, that's not the right setup. Yeah, it's too much stack up.
00:07:20
Speaker
too much stack up. And I don't even know that the Pearson itself, I'm not saying it's not. But actually, I think there are some spec numbers of 2,000 or 3,000 pounds. Don't quote me on that. And I don't know what that's hold down versus clamping. But nevertheless, that's not what I do or plan on doing. I'm not worried about it. All right, speaking of Jay. So those of you listening, John and I are on a video chat right now. So I'm going to show John something. And he's going to narrate for us.
Streamlining Production with Process Boards
00:07:49
Speaker
Oh my god. No! You did it! I did it. Are you serious? Yeah, so what do you see?
00:08:00
Speaker
Oh, okay, so folks, we'll put a link in the description of this podcast to the Pearson Tour, where Jay has made these relatively simple boards that walk through each of his products and sub-assembly products and the machine they should run on in the weekday, and anyone has the right to go change it.
00:08:19
Speaker
And there's just so much awesomeness behind it. I don't want to sound smug, but it was just so cool. And the cool thing, too, is that it's not permanent. They need to reprint them if they buy a machine, if they change a machine, if something changes. And so I'm looking at Grimsmo's garage door, which has got three. Yours looks a lot more than his. I've seen a bunch of black dots on three, or you walk us through it.
00:08:45
Speaker
Yeah, so I basically copied what Jay did exactly. I've been emailing with him a lot this week. Last Friday, Eric and I were talking about process workflow. And the problem is I've got all this information in my head. And if Eric interrupts me and tells me that I need
00:09:02
Speaker
It's just another thing to add to the list. I don't have a visual cue. So when you went to Jay's shop and did that video, and he walked through all the processes, and anybody can walk in and see, oh, we're low on stock on these things. Everything else is fine. Don't even think about it. That kind of blew my mind watching that. So thank you for showing that. I don't understand why you can't keep 250 sub-assembly product inventory levels in your head. Exactly.
00:09:29
Speaker
Yeah, so I probably spent five or ten hours over the weekend redoing Jay's thing for myself and making a couple of improvements that he actually really liked. Like for op one, op two, op three, he had them blank, but I filled in, turned, cleaned, nothing. Or milled, tumbled, nothing, or milled heat treat, and then milled the bevels, et cetera, so that anybody going up can know.
00:09:54
Speaker
So are you willing to post a picture of this to Instagram? Yeah, and
Collaborations for Workflow Improvement
00:09:58
Speaker
I will for sure. I want to do a full walkthrough YouTube video of them. Okay. So folks, check out Grimz Monae's Instagram or his YouTube channel. By the time this podcast comes out, hopefully that will be up. Yeah, yeah.
00:10:10
Speaker
So it's, man, it's just been absolutely amazing getting them up. Barry mounted them the other day. And as you said, they're just 36 by 48 pieces of printed paper, which cost me $4 each. And I can walk to the place from my house. So you just use like a, we have a staples. I don't know. Yeah.
00:10:32
Speaker
It's a local print shop, but it basically does whatever that is. They just need a large frame printer. And yeah, four bucks for each sheet. So I'm out of there for like $14, taxes in and everything. And I could get them laminated for another $20 each or something, but I'm like, you know what? I'm going to change these probably by next week.
00:10:48
Speaker
So for only $4 each, I don't care if they get smudged up or whatever. And Jay spray glued his onto the thing and he talked about wrinkling problems and all this stuff, but I just magnified mine to the board and like super easy. So yeah, we bought these galvanized sheets, which actually cut me pretty good on my fingers.
00:11:11
Speaker
and screwed them to the wall, as you said. And it's just fantastic. So you can't open your garage door right now? We can open it seven feet tall, which is enough for everything except New Machine Day, which is very, very far away. So we're fine. That's hilarious. It's funny, because when we started the video call this morning, but before we hit record for the podcast, Scrims was like, I've got a surprise for you. And I love that you know that that is the coolest surprise for you.
00:11:39
Speaker
And it's funny because, God, this is turning into the Pearson Fanboy Club. We have these quality control sheets for our Tormach fixture plates. And I went through four iterations of it myself. And then I was like, you know what? I'd really like Jay's help on this. But it's got to be a win for him. There's no such thing as free in my life. So I said, Jay, would you be willing to do a joint video where you walk through improving my sheet and then I'll give you some exposure on our YouTube channel?
00:12:08
Speaker
And so he did and that led us to versions five and six and his feedback was embarrassing me off. So just yesterday I finished filming the sort of before and after edits to it and we'll have that video up next week. So by the time this podcast comes out showing a simple one page.
00:12:25
Speaker
quality control workflow worksheet that is and I when we did the video I sort of start off by saying you can't you can't I can't just walk you through the end result because that doesn't do you any good as a viewer I need to start you from where I started and then quickly go through what went on in my head and how we went from version one two three to four etc because that's what gets you to the end result but it's it makes me happy it literally makes me happy
Goal Setting and Managing Distractions
00:12:51
Speaker
Yeah, as this board literally makes me happy. It's actually calmed me down. Like Jay told me, the funny thing is the more pins on the board, the less stressed you feel.
00:13:01
Speaker
Got it. So how long have you had it up? Has everybody, Barry's using it, Eric's using it? Yeah, we're just starting to use it. So it's been up and populated since about yesterday. So we're just kind of filling in all the things, our inventory levels and et cetera, and actually wrote the min and max inventories for each item on the thing, like printed on the board.
00:13:21
Speaker
I'm happy enough to go up and change things with Sharpie as we kind of modify and edit. And I told the guys, I'm like, feel free if someone looks stupid or wrong or whatever, just take a Sharpie and write it. And then for the next iteration, I can go in and change it properly. But yeah, the thing is, don't be afraid of perfection. Just get something out there.
00:13:40
Speaker
Eric was mildly offended that I did this over the weekend, got the printed on Monday morning, and didn't consult him. Not that I need to, but because he had a couple thoughts in mind. And I'm like, if both of us do this, it's never going to get done. I just have to jump on it, get it printed, and then we can change and edit as we go along, et cetera.
00:13:59
Speaker
You have to just do it. Just jump in, yeah. Sail fast, sail cheap. Also we have a shipping, everything you need to know to ship a package is now printed on a sheet of paper and it sucks, but it's a start. Yes. And yesterday I taught Eric how to do all the shipping and there's some, you know, details involved in the way we ship the knives and it's great. Like Eric shipped off 15, 20 knives yesterday, it was awesome.
00:14:26
Speaker
I love, I mean, I think it's in our blood. I don't have any interest in compartmentalizing people's obligations here, their responsibilities, but there's some natural amount of that that has to happen for a business to run. So like, Noah handles our shipping right now. But Noah's been working on some really awesome projects. And like right now, I'm in California next week. I need him to finish something today so I can take a look at it and have him work on it while I'm gone. And I'm like, man, I wish Zach, our intern, could handle shipping.
00:14:56
Speaker
Lean is great, but it doesn't just happen in two hours. So I need to do it. The shipping is on those computer right now, which is because I'm a bootstrapper. I need to buy a dedicated shipping PC, blah, blah, blah. So good problems to have. What if you just buy the cheapest little Chromebook or something for a shipping computer, right? Yeah, but fun fact. It sounds like you need to get Zach on shipping immediately.
00:15:20
Speaker
growth eats cash. I am feeling incredibly, so this is, there's so much awesome stuff going on. I gotta say, throw it out before we move on though. A board like that reminds me of something I had, I had a little frustrating day on Monday and Tuesday, and I was like, you have to keep in mind the goal. I've never been a huge goal person, and I've never even been a huge budget person. We did a video on budgets when I talk about why I think they're a little bit of a fallacy.
00:15:48
Speaker
But that has changed for me for two reasons. One, I need to know goals because I need to be able to think about, especially as I move to a little bit of a higher level, where I want to go. But also, unless I have goals, you're sorry, goals are the tool that allow me to say no. That board on your garage is what lets you say no to doing the wrong thing. I had a guy pull up. Yeah.
00:16:14
Speaker
I had a guy pull up from a respected local company, and he wanted an Acme screw thing fixed. And I have this weakness. And you're going to laugh. This sounds silly. This is like saying, by weaknesses, I work too hard. But I love being the hero. I love having somebody come up and say, we need your help. And me saying, oh, we can help. We've got the equipment. We've got the tools. We've got the knowledge. That's not what I do. I don't think I can build a business out of that. That's why I don't do it. I don't have the range of skill sets and so forth.
00:16:42
Speaker
Having specific goals, it means John isn't saying no, the goals are saying no. That's really fantastic. I actually wrote that down because otherwise we're completely just pulled in every fun direction that we possibly choose.
00:16:57
Speaker
But it's not my saying, it's just like what Jason, the process is the boss. Right, right, yeah. Now the board is the boss for us and it makes things very clear. I mean, as we set it up, yeah, there's a lot of stuff out of stock, but we actually made black pins and white pins and now the white pins are the uber critical ones and there's only a few on the board, so I'm like, I know exactly what I need to make next. And nothing happens before that.
00:17:19
Speaker
Are you going to have Barry go through once a day and inspect inventory and update? No. The beauty of it is everybody just eyeballs the board, take a peek at it, make sure you understand where everything's at at your leisure. And little Kanban cards or minimum inventory things are what triggers the board, triggers production like what Jay was saying.
00:17:43
Speaker
So Eric will have, say for a pivot screw, Eric will have a minimum baggie of 20 or 30 and a baggie. And the second he cracks into that, it triggers production on the board. So if he opens that bag, he knows pursuant to a Kanban car that he must walk over to the board and move a marker.
00:18:00
Speaker
Yes, and move a pin over to the, or if he's upstairs then he can just ask somebody else walking by to just move it over real quick or whatever. But yeah, that'll trigger production and then I know that I have a reasonable amount of time to get started on that in the next few days, not like immediately, but also not three weeks from now. So this is something that we'll tweak as we go along.
Efficient Production Practices
00:18:23
Speaker
It keeps everything out of everybody's heads and onto the board and into the Kanban cards and it's just so utterly fantastic.
00:18:32
Speaker
That's awesome. Since we're legitimately a product-based company, and I can actually write down every single thing that we make. And it's not as many parts as I thought it was. Looking at Jay's board, he's got both columns completely filled up with parts for all these vacuum systems and everything. And I'm like, oh, I have a lot of parts. And I have probably 2-thirds the parts that he does, like the individual pieces to make. Really? Yeah, that really surprised me, too. He only had two boards. You got three. He's got three.
00:19:01
Speaker
The assembly board, the manufacturing status board, and then the machine production board. So I am going out to Pearson again on Wednesday. Cool.
00:19:16
Speaker
And we're going to follow a product. That was my idea. Because I didn't understand a few little things. Kind of like what you said. To me, that's a weakness. It may be my own. If I have to remember to go do something, that in and of itself defeats the process. If I crack the bag open, but I forget to open up, that's dangerous misinformation. I want one of those Amazon dash dot buttons next to the bag that I just punch. And then the board automatically updates. So I don't have to.
00:19:46
Speaker
That risk. Anyway, we're gonna follow a product through to try to better learn more about how he does this.
00:19:54
Speaker
I think very well. Yes, and I actually had a lot of follow-up questions after watching your video about six times and I've been emailing him and he actually filmed a video reply for me which helped insanely a lot. Awesome. And just him walking through a couple things and you know I'm constantly asking questions like if there's the you know we have two blocks on the board one says chop and prep and then the other is mill.
00:20:20
Speaker
If Barry chops and preps all the parts, does the pins stick? Like if we have a bar, we'll cut it up. Separate or whatever you call it. How do you cut it up when you don't own a bandsaw?
00:20:31
Speaker
That's what we have a CNC mill for, my friend. I love you. Oh my god. But yeah, so we were confused. If Barry's already done the chop and prep, does the pin stay there? Does it go into the mill section, even though it hasn't been milled yet? So I asked Jay, I'm like, this is a stupid question, but where does the thing go? And he goes, it goes right on the line between the two. Signifying it's done with this, and it's not into that, and it's ready for that. So I'm like, oh.
00:20:55
Speaker
Obvious, yeah, duh. But I felt like I was doing it wrong or feeling stupid, but he's like, there is no wrong. There's whatever feels comfortable and whatever makes sense. And he's like, I'm not right for a lot of it, so just do whatever feels right.
00:21:10
Speaker
Yeah, but it's not stupid. We have, let's say our QC sheet was for Grimms and Knives. We had a section that said, it's for the Tormach fixture plate. So it's like right in 440, 770 or 1100. It was, you know, model colon in an empty space. Yeah. Jay was like, what are you doing? Pre-print for, you know, pre-print RASP or Norseman. And then the QC operator just has to circle one. Yeah.
00:21:36
Speaker
The hell would you write out Norseman every time when you can just circle it? And you know what's funny about that is it's so obvious, but I'll tell you, that changes my attitude. When I have to fill something out and the information already existed, but they're making, it's like when you call a credit card company and they make you, you know, they make you recite your family history just to get through to an operator. And then when you get through to the operator, they're like, who's calling? And you're like, I just gave you my whole life history. All my social security number, like everything. And you don't claim you don't know who I am.
00:22:06
Speaker
Sorry, it gets me worked up. Anyway, the other crazy thing, which I just feel like I'm learning some lessons about how I, and maybe this is somewhat symptomatic of being an entrepreneur, of where you have a little, just a little bit of
00:22:25
Speaker
of a sense of delusion about the world and the reality because you live in your own reality.
Quality Control and Budgeting
00:22:32
Speaker
But a lot of times I just think things don't apply to me. Like, oh, I'll do a better job and thus that won't happen to me. And I'm starting to realize like when I hear about shops talk about having
00:22:45
Speaker
You know broad statistical process control and calibrating all of their measuring tools like all of a sudden I'm really holy cow We make a whole bunch of bad parts because I had a micrometer that was that's now a five
00:22:58
Speaker
Figure problem if I have an instrument and so all of a sudden I'm like I have to actually think about that or What I wrote down to tell you was budgeting I don't necessarily care about Income in lost budgets because I have a good enough sense of our fixed overhead Obligations relative to what we're able to generally produce on high and low weeks that I know where we'll stay in the clear but I have
00:23:25
Speaker
For the first time ever, we have over $50,000 in accounts receivable. And we have over 20 in payables. And that's all OK. It's not mismanagement. That's not letting people string you out and so forth. Now it's really the point where, and I said this a month or two ago on a budgeting video, but the bank account balance has nothing to do with how safe I am.
00:23:55
Speaker
That's why I said I'm feeling really poor. I'm like, I gotta really buckle down. Just like with the process board, it's getting too big for your immediate headspace that you need to have it somewhere so that you can actually take in all the information and understand it all. Or the math and the formulas, whatever does it for you.
00:24:18
Speaker
Do you guys huddle around the board? I know that's one day old. Yeah, totally. Morning or night? I don't know if we will. Jay said that he does a quick one minute meeting with everybody, one minute board meeting at the end of the day around the board. And literally, all it would take is one minute to stand around and be like, look, this is what we do tomorrow. Bye. Go to bed. That's all it's going to take. So we might do something like that.
00:24:45
Speaker
Yeah. Cool. I am super excited for it. Doing good for you. That's really cool. The hurdle of, it's like, I think about, oh, you got to build this from scratch. You got to get the graphic design done. You got to figure out how to get it printed. You got to get having to get it mounted. Like you break all those little things down, you just do it and then you iterate it and evolve it. Yeah. That's awesome.
Enhancing Office Productivity
00:25:06
Speaker
Yeah, my excitement for getting it just done, like right now, is what made it happen. The boards were $4 to print, but everything else kind of added up to a lot of money, even the magnets. I spent 60 bucks on magnets themselves just for the board, and the sheet metal was about 60 bucks, and it was like all this stuff. Really? Yeah, it was kind of surprising.
00:25:29
Speaker
Yeah, it just adds up, but at the end of the day, it's like, get it done. Yes, absolutely. It's funny, I had a huge improvement, which more so than I expected, which is I do use twin monitors for my desktop in my office. And I used to be a huge twin monitor fan. Now I think it's a little bit more of a distraction. That's funny.
00:25:52
Speaker
Well, it's been now proven you can't really multitask. But I do like having it up for simply having a print on one side and a fusion on the other. Or if I'm writing a reading from an email while I'm doing a quote on the other side or something like that, it's good to have it there. Anyway, I bought those, what do you call them, dual monitor support brackets. So I won't even show you because
00:26:19
Speaker
No one on the radio can see it, but it holds your monitors up on those support arms. Okay. So they're not on my desk. Yeah. So now I can reposition them. Now if somebody comes into my office, I can just push them aside. It opens up my desk area to keep my desk cleaner. And it just looks nice. It makes me feel like it's just a, it's just all these summation of these little things. And I'm like, this is,
00:26:41
Speaker
Awesome way more than I thought I thought I was doing it just for the convenience really because it's weird if somebody comes into my office And I don't have a way to like get my mom. Yeah, you're hiding behind. Yeah And it's just been really cool. That's awesome. Maybe post a picture on Instagram or something
00:26:57
Speaker
Great idea, I will do that today. Yeah, I was laughing because at my home computer
Work-Life Balance Challenges
00:27:02
Speaker
I've had dual monitors for years and I've always been a huge fan of dual monitors and now at work I only use my laptop and most of the time at home I bring my laptop home and I do all my work at the kitchen table on my laptop and I just don't use my main PC anymore because it's kind of hidden in the basement now and it's there but yeah.
00:27:23
Speaker
When we were talking about that idea, for me the laptop is the force multiplier of never having idle time and I posted a picture and I thought people might get mad at me but I don't really care. I was at the pool with the kids and I had this
00:27:40
Speaker
Fusion idea and rather than email myself or rather put on a to-do list I just the kids are happy they're playing and I was there with them from the majority of it But I went over to our little table and I whipped up in my laptop and I just started banging out this fusion thing Really quickly and I was happy I did it because instead of adding to a future application I got it sort of visualized and done while I had that fresh energy and then I
00:28:05
Speaker
When I'm driving home, I can start thinking about the next version of it, rather than worried about getting the first version out. Right. And then you put too much worry into the first version, and once you finally get to it, then you're that much further behind in the creative process.
00:28:21
Speaker
But it just makes me happy. There's no such thing as the start and the end of the work day. It's that ever going question of how family, life, work balance. I love what I do. That's what I want to do. I don't want to do it in a manner that ever compromises the upbringing my kids have. But on the flip side, I love working and that's an important attribute of life.
00:28:42
Speaker
I was talking with somebody the other day that is more the fan of what is it about society's convention that makes us work 40 hours a week or whatever. Why? In Europe they get five weeks of vacation, not two weeks of vacation, all this stuff. He was kind of advocating working less in general and I'm like, I kind of wish I could work more.
00:29:05
Speaker
I have family obligations and I spend a lot of time with my family and take the kids to school kind of thing. Part of me wishes I could just be here at the shop more and crush more to get farther in life faster. And I love what I do, utterly and absolutely, is stress and problems included. It's all the package, right?
00:29:28
Speaker
To me, it's always weird saying this with you on the thing because you're Canadian. I don't mean this in an exclusive manner, but it's the American dream. I've built this based on nothing but hard work and determination. I love what I do.
00:29:46
Speaker
I've actually known quite a few really, really smart people, far smarter than your normal person. And those people, some of them have done well, some of them are so smart that they don't know how to handle life. And I will tell you that all the people I've seen that are productive in a manner that I relate to are the people that are intelligent but ultimately have a really good work discipline. Yeah, work ethic and... Work your butt off. There you go.
00:30:13
Speaker
What's on tap for today? It's actually funny. Yesterday, I tried to make these, you know, I make our knife bearings on the lathe, but I was having, a couple weeks ago, I was having a problem with one of the tools loading up with Delrin plastic.
Knife Bearing Production Issues
00:30:27
Speaker
And so I'm like, I set it up, I made one good part, and then I ran it all night, and I was gonna make 200 parts, but I come back. I remember that. Yeah, and it just made like five parts, and the rest just was melting. Didn't it do like 194 ops on the same part? Exactly, yeah.
00:30:41
Speaker
So I'm trying to fix that problem now by adding an air blast to the main spindle. Yep, so the lathe comes with an air blast for the sub spindle and I'm like, oh, if I remove this plug, I'll get air for the main spindle too. No, the plug is just empty.
00:30:57
Speaker
So I took some panels off and I looked behind the machine and I followed the airlines and there is no hookup for Maine. Like there's a threaded hole where you could plumb up air supply, but I had to plumb up my own air supply and there's a rack of solenoids with only one solenoid for the sub spindle. And I'm like, why wouldn't they ship the lathe? Was it an option that you did that? I think, yeah, it's like a super hidden option. Like I kind of bought the lathe as is. I didn't custom order it.
00:31:27
Speaker
But I was just kind of disappointed. You pay a lot of money for a lathe that has an option on the sub that it doesn't have on the main. It probably cost $100 solenoid. I wouldn't have even blinked in the main cost of the machine anyway. So instead of adding another solenoid, I just teed off the line going to the sub spindle. So now both spindles get air at the same time. And I just tried it this morning before our chat. It seems to be blowing off the chips that are causing the problem. So today I'll be making knife bearings.
00:31:58
Speaker
Is it a milling operation or a turning operation that's created in the engine? It's a turning operation. So I drill out the inside diameter and then I bore it with a little threading tool and I put chamfers on the inside of the thing. So it's just creating little stringies on the little internal threading tool.
00:32:15
Speaker
the threading tool that you're using to bore. There's no way to break those chips unless you make it an interrupted cut. Could you effectively peck bore it and then do a final half a thou clean up? Yeah, and it's plastic. There's not a super critical tolerance. I just want the bore to be a relatively good diameter and I want the chamfers to be on the inside. And I've hand-coated that little section of code anyway because Fusion won't let you bore with a threading tool.
00:32:45
Speaker
Yeah, that's annoying. But yeah, I think peck boring it would be definitely an option. You don't have to retract all the weight, but just make it interrupted. And that'll probably help even with your air blast blowing, because if you blow off a 12-inch spaghetti noodle, it'll never come off. It just wraps around, yeah. Does your lathe have extra M-codes and solenoids and stuff?
00:33:12
Speaker
I don't know about solenoids, but I think there are plenty of options that you could do stuff if you wanted to.
00:33:17
Speaker
Yeah, but you need IO. Marker IO. I'm sure the IOs are there. Oh, that's what you mean for solenoid. I thought you meant like air solenoid or something. Well, so like for us, the whole goal if we do the Pearson's will be some form of automation if we can figure it out. So having the G code or M code to be specific, having it release the pneumatic hold down on the Pearson automatically.
00:33:43
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, that would be awesome. Like, super awesome. Super awesome. Yes. Yes. So what do you have to do today? Oh my gosh. Oh, we have, okay, so we have a, oh, I'm gonna say it, because I
Excitement for McMaster-Carr Visit and TIG Welding Class
00:33:57
Speaker
don't care anymore. I didn't post it earlier, because I didn't want to mention it and have that come back and bite me, but McMaster Car emailed us, and they're like, can we come to your shop? Oh my goodness. And I'm like, I literally just wrote back yes,
00:34:15
Speaker
I didn't ask why, I didn't ask what they want, and it could be nothing. It could be, for all I know it could even be a sales type call, but I think it may not be. So I didn't want to post it on social media because I didn't want McMaster to say, okay, this guy's, they're such a quiet company and sort of private company that I didn't want to screw it, but they're coming today. We have our first TIG class that's happening in like 14 minutes.
00:34:40
Speaker
And my nine-month-old daughter has a Father's Day luncheon at school, which I'm really excited to go to. And then just the usual crushing it. There you go. Yeah, life is good. So you know what happened with McMaster? They saw that their catalog was in your bathroom as main bathroom material. They saw that picture and were like, yeah, we like this guy.
00:35:05
Speaker
That's awesome. Yeah. I'm very curious to see what happens. Yeah. Well, let us know. Yeah, for sure. That's fantastic. Yeah, cool. Look, crush your butt. Sounds good. You too. I'll see you. Take care. Bye.