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#368 Weird door alarm on Okuma
719 Plays8 months ago
TOPICS:
- weird door alarm on Okuma
- Product design and prototyping
- Tolerancing parts
- Nut runner torque wrenches
- Lapping parts FLAT
- Johnny 5 robot!
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Transcript
Introduction and Machine Shop vs. Machinist
00:00:00
Speaker
Good morning. Welcome to the business of machining episode number 368. My name is John Saunders. And my name is John Grimsmo. And John and I talk each week about the joys of, in differences of running a machine shop versus being a machinist. Yes. Yeah.
Machine Breakdowns and ATC Recovery
00:00:18
Speaker
And in the spirit of trying to keep this both candid, but also even though it's a podcast, just supposed to be me and you talking. I just got hit with a double whammy of two machines broken within 12 hours of each other.
00:00:34
Speaker
And neither one was a wear item. The other one was a door that on the Akuma that actually I need to talk to gospel about this because I don't understand why during the ATC sequence on our horizontal, which is a, I mean, there's numerous things that happen in the like PLC chain and follow along with it with the ATC with a regular old tool change. Um, a couple of times over the history of that machine, the door has itself kind of bumped open during the change. I've heard you talk about this before.
00:01:04
Speaker
I don't understand why the interlock would ever go into an unlocked state during a tool change because that appears to be what allows this to happen. Then during the tool change, the door thinks it's been opened or has been opened a millimeter past the door key.
00:01:23
Speaker
The ATC throws an alarm, ATC stops. The few times it's happened before, the ATC recovery has worked. This morning, the ATC recovery did not work. And so tip of the hat to Gossager, they have done this three times now. This is the third. They tell you they won't do support for ATCs because of safety reasons.
00:01:46
Speaker
spend time who am I on and negotiating over like, no, we're going to do this. And, um, and we got fixed. Good. So that's, that's great. But you know, that's, I had a nice little list of two hours of things to do this morning and I'm just sitting down to catch up with you. But look, I'm incredibly happy. It's fixed. Good. Good. Um, yeah, kind of similar to yesterday.
Speedio Machine Issues and Bluetooth Interference
00:02:12
Speaker
I come in, um,
00:02:14
Speaker
came in a little bit later and I spent some good time in the front shop and then by the time I get to the machine shop, Angelo's like, I need your help right now. I've been struggling with the speedio for like three hours now. The probes giving weird alarms and something I didn't expect is I know that the aroa, the pallet changer will stop if the speedio E stops or turns off.
00:02:36
Speaker
But the aroa also stops if the speedio gets stuck on a probe alarm, which I'm very surprised by. Say that one more time. Say you're trying to probe a surface and you can't find it. The probe just goes, I can't find what I'm looking for. That's like a soft probe alarm. That was happening for various reasons.
00:03:00
Speaker
That turned off the pallet changer as well, which also turns it off for the current. Sure. Oh my God. If that were to happen in the middle of the night, then the current can't use the pallet changer. I'm like, that's a soft alarm. I didn't think it would stop with that. I know it stops with an E stop and with a power off. This, this is new to me. This, uh, the speedo probe needs to get deep six, man. It does. I emailed bloom last night and I was like, guys, like somebody's got to come in and fix this because we're going to get you a Hymer. Yeah.
00:03:30
Speaker
Um, yeah, it's, it's reading erratically. It's like the skip signal is not always getting to the machine or there's some interference. Um, I heard one Yamazan tech was telling me that he had a customer with a Bluetooth speaker. Yeah. That interfered with the radio signal. And I was like, what? Okay. Do I just need to switch to a different channel or something? Like.
00:03:52
Speaker
We don't really have any active Bluetooth devices, but my phone Bluetooth is always on and I don't know, whatever. Um, this feels like a Spencer web question to be like, Hey, cause you don't, you don't really want to go buy an IR, even if, cause those aren't free and that's where I set up to change everything. Yeah. But, uh, I kind of do want to, but that's with this radio thing, dude. Yeah. It's not working for me. It's causing weird problems. I don't know if it's my setup or something, but, um,
00:04:22
Speaker
I don't know. I think IR is way more common, but a lot of people do run radio. They must. Yeah. It's not like radio is a defective product, but short of putting a Faraday cage around the whole speedio. Although, but yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah. So that's, that's my weird little, um,
00:04:42
Speaker
thing, but we got it going. It's just a weird, like the recovery process from this probe alarm, basically. The light stayed on blinking and Angela's like, I've tried everything. I took the batteries out, I restarted the machine. And then I came in, I took the batteries out, I restarted the machine and it worked fine. So wait, Angela couldn't even clear the alarm. Yeah.
00:05:05
Speaker
Of course he could. He could clear the alarm, but he couldn't run it again without getting that alarm as well. OK, yeah, huh? And then the restart seemed to help.
Error Recovery and Focus
00:05:17
Speaker
I wonder how the people and friends we know from military to dentists who have true multi-machine automation cells that have- Yeah, that's a good question. ... ROAs and CMMs and machines. Obviously, if one machine's batteries die, you don't want to shut down the cell, but there also is safety standards around- Yeah, it might have to, right? Well, these stops have to be intertwined. Yes, and it's weird, but you're right. As it gets more than two machines,
00:05:46
Speaker
that would get tricky. And it's always some dumb little thing that shuts down the whole line, you know? Like even our Nakamura yesterday, I think
00:05:58
Speaker
We're making the pocket clip and there's a part where it's spindles are synced and the bee comes in to grab the part. And it's like, and I think Jeff, I don't know why, but he accidentally hit the feed hold button or he panicked or something real quick and he paused it during that moment. And it's like, you don't do that because the recovery from that took him like two hours to figure out how to unsync the machine properly. Um,
00:06:21
Speaker
I think the cliff notes was the call it has to be unclamped for the B to move, which I seem to remember is a rule. And we forgot about that in the moment. Once he finally unclamped the call it, then everything made sense and the recovery procedure worked. But
00:06:40
Speaker
a little like add that note to the list of recovery options. Yeah. Yeah, little stuff like that. But I told him I was like, being able to recover a machine is super important skill. Like, it's not fun, but you have to be able to recover. Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I like, I mean, I gotta say, um,
00:06:59
Speaker
I'm in one of those mindsets now where I probably just need to go chill for a little bit because it was like an hour and like two hours of being totally in the zone, switching in that of there's an Akuma system check safety mode override that you can go into that where you can do things that could be unsafe, that you need to do it to recover these. So you're just like you're totally in the zone, you're making sure as you switch parameters, you're not losing track. So you're not trying to go, you're for sure being very deliberate, but also you're not going so slow that you're
00:07:29
Speaker
Like you got to just be sharp, I guess. And just pulls a lot of focus away. And then, and then we were done and I, three people asking or coming up to me or asking, I'm like, nope, nope, like high vis vest on that figuratively. And I'm like, I'm taking my notes right now, but I had notes from the past time. It was really helped. And then our little info sheet on the machine has the serial number of the support number. I was on the phone with the gospel support guy in two minutes without digging through for that info. And.
00:07:58
Speaker
So in some respects, it's like, hey, this is, you know, suck it up, John, this is this is like, there's a person who owns a bunch of machines. Yeah, she's actually, yeah. That's just how it goes.
Integral Knife Prototyping
00:08:08
Speaker
And I'm getting more to that point. I know we've joked about this in the past years, you know, friends of ours that have much bigger shops, and they're like, Oh, another spindle, whatever. Yeah. And before we were at that point, it's like, I can't even imagine. And now we're getting to that point where it's like, it's another day, like, yeah. Yeah.
00:08:30
Speaker
What are you going to do? It's weird. Positive notes. Positive notes only. Vibes. I forget where I left you off, but I got the Willeman fully calibrated, super tight, very, very happy with the results of the accuracy of the calibration. And there's like five different things you have to do. And I was very confused at what order they have to be done at. You know, like align the B axis.
00:08:56
Speaker
calibrate the probe, do pivot point calibration, laser calibration, and something else. And I figured that there was an order to them, and they have to be done in the right order. And I finally figured that out. I wrote myself in GURP. I wrote a big, long procedural document. I was like, crash the z-axis? Here's how you fix it.
00:09:19
Speaker
referencing all of Wilhelmin's tech documents on how to do it, but there's still extra notes that I want to put into those documents to make it more clear. And some of my own pictures and stuff. So it felt really good to finally get that going. Like it took me a long time. That's awesome. The machine was down for a while, but now I feel so much more close to it, you know, like intimately knowledgeable about how it works. And then it's been making great parts ever since. So
00:09:45
Speaker
Good. So not only is it fixed, but you've been using it? Yep, been using it. Awesome. Yep, using it to finalize some of the prototype parts for our new integral knife, the stop pins and the button and figuring out that the stop pins and the button affect everything else. They affect the handle, they affect the blade, they affect the way that they feel.
00:10:08
Speaker
It's like, while I would love to jump forward to a project like the pocket clip, which will make the knife like feel better and feel better in the hand and stuff. I have to get these functional tweaks down, like nailed down perfect first, otherwise not pass go, you know? Because already my tweaks to the stop in are going to require rev change on the handle and on the blade. So I got to make new of those.
00:10:35
Speaker
Interesting design ethos to have like, what's the sort of driver versus driven, right? Yeah, tolerances all that. That's true. Yeah. Yep. And it's like, I need, I need to put my yellow vest on and they need to just like, um, and I have been, um,
00:10:54
Speaker
Focus on this, wrap my head around it. Okay, if that goes up by a thou, then this has to go down by a thou. And if I do that, then I need to put clearance on the blade here so that it actually rotates and fits around and doesn't look dumb and all these things. And then remembering not just to do it in CAD, but to do it in CAM for each of these parts on three different machines. And it's fun, but prototyping a new product is easy.
00:11:22
Speaker
like you notice that with the puck chuck the past year it's like yes you know it sounds super doable on paper and it is super doable but there's a lot to it can I ask on the integral do you have a
Parametric CAD and CAM Challenges
00:11:38
Speaker
sort of correctly done MasterCAD where if you update a component like the stop pin, the clearance hole diameter on a separate component like the handler blade also links to it? Good question. Possibly. Maybe one or two examples of that, yeah.
00:11:59
Speaker
Like on say the handle CAD, I might have a stop pin, X raft or imported or whatever it is. And then project the line and then offset the line, something like that. I think I do have some of that, but I definitely need to like validate and confirm everything. And then make sure the CAM works too, because to make the handle has like, I haven't counted, but just looking at the list, there's like a hundred operations in CAM.
00:12:27
Speaker
Wow. Just to do all the little features and stuff, and scrolling through it, I'm like, really? OK, well, it is what it is. And yeah, just make sure they're all valid. Yeah. Alex has done a really good job as a true engineer of improving how we handle stuff like correct parametric. We don't have products like you do. Most of our products aren't done that way.
00:12:55
Speaker
Pachuk being one that is though. And it's a lot. I have a lot of respect.
00:13:04
Speaker
for that being done well. We've all been there. Anybody who's listening, who's opened Fusion and created a multi, like an assembly, it's kind of like, at some point you're like, ah, I wish I had done that differently. Like you just bring it to the sketch. The sketch is in the wrong component and you didn't catch it and you don't want to redo it or x-rays or derives or not. And I'm at the point now where I'm deep into that. I'm years into that of me being the only one looking at it. So I kind of know where everything is and I'm trying to teach my guys like where to find everything. And they open up the file and it's just,
00:13:34
Speaker
I don't want to say it's messy, but it's complex and it is kind of messy and there's like so much to it and they just kind of, their eyes gloss over and they're like, I don't know what I'm looking at here. I'm like, okay, well take a breath. Like it's logical, right? Like to me. Yeah. Well, just like on tight fits, you know, we, so for example, my advice, we now,
00:13:59
Speaker
do published revs of internal dimensional drawings of tolerance ranges that have target ranges and scrap ranges. Target meaning, I think we talked about this, target meaning that's what we really want to hit. But if it's outside the target range,
00:14:17
Speaker
We don't throw it away unless it's also outside the scrap range. Right. Because it's sort of like, hey, I don't want to have everyone at four tenths over. We want it to be two tenths over. But if one comes off of three or four tenths over, it's OK. I don't want to. It's unacceptable to continue making them at four tenths and not not thinking. Sure. Well, because that's the thing. I've talked to other machinists and they're like, dude, I will use the entire tolerance band. Like that's it's my job to you want plus or minus one thou. I will make plus or minus nine tenths all day long.
00:14:45
Speaker
And me as the entrepreneur and machine is like, no, I want zero all the time. Like, that's what I'm shooting for when I make a part. Yeah, it's not real, though. I know it's not real, but yeah, so I kind of like where you're going with that.
00:14:57
Speaker
Well, and you could sort of, the same way of what I'm saying is effectively treating tolerance bands like a Belkirk. Like you have every right to use all of it, but I'd still want the majority in a certain section of it. And so the simple way, and this was inspired by reading about one of the Toyota production books was, on the my advice, if we want the stack to be,
Machining Tolerance Strategies
00:15:20
Speaker
of two parts to be a nominal one inch than in their equal parts. So one of the parts is half inch, the other parts half inch. What we do is the bell curve skews low on one and it skews high on the other. That way, if we're perfect, they're perfect. But if we err on one and we err on the other one, the sum shouldn't compound the issue. Okay, interesting, yeah. Works out well. Interesting, I like that. But I guess one reason I brought that up was that
00:15:50
Speaker
where do you, where these minor changes, and we're talking about 10ths here, you know, do they happen in tool wear? Do they happen in fusion stock to leave? Or, well, we don't use coordinate systems for stuff like this, but they could, you could use coordinate system change. And we document that with a processor with a yellow sheet. So I'm, I'm actually happy and proud of where we are on that right now, but it also means you're doing all these nominal changes that never are actually reflected in the quote unquote nominal CAD.
00:16:19
Speaker
Yes, you're after the fact kind of changes. Yeah. This is assemblies via can tolerances. Exactly. I was just looking at that last night, making G10 and carbon fiber inlays for our Norseman knife. I finally made a big sheet on the video. I saw that. Yeah, two days ago. It worked out really good, except
00:16:39
Speaker
So I was there to finish the run and it actually finished and all the parts were still there. And then I went home and it was great. And then in the morning, the guys took all the parts off and then passed them forward to the front shop. I never had a chance to inspect them and validate my work kind of thing. And then Eric comes up to me and he's like, they don't fit. I was like, oh no. That's why I wanted to inspect them and look under the microscope and see what's going on and stuff.
00:17:03
Speaker
Turns out that they don't fit by about half a thou. They fit. They fit. But they're super tight. And what happens, especially with carving such an abrasive material like carbon fiber, is the tool, especially the bottom of the tool, where I use it a little bit more often, the diamond coating chips off ever so slightly. So I lose like half a tenth or a thou on the
00:17:31
Speaker
on the diameter of the tool, just on the lower part. So like the sidewalls of the part go down and then they flare out just a little bit. So that was part of it. And I was going through again, do I,
00:17:44
Speaker
Do I make my whole tolerance 394 instead of 393 to make them all fit? Like in CAD or do I just competent CAM or do I have the probe compensated and change that value? I was thinking about that and I didn't really come up with an answer yet, but I think in a perfect world, your CAD is what you want. Like your CAD should be real life, you know? So if anybody references, they're like, oh, part in hand and part on the machine, on the computer says the same, right?
00:18:15
Speaker
Well, but but no, because what we're trying to talk about is the fact that there is no such thing as perfect, right? Like, really, there is not. And I'm not trying to be wise crack about this, like, in getting out, you know, you know, scanning electron microscopes, like literally, like, you know, it's not uncommon for a part to be off by at least 10. So it's kind of like, and I don't know enough about how, you know, how do
00:18:46
Speaker
How does an Airbus or Boeing engineer handle this stuff in the systems? I'd love to learn more. Just because I'm curious to see how this is handled at the big boy world. When we want a nominal half inch and I'm willing to say minus two tenths plus four tenths as my scrap range and inside of that is a tighter band, that's a
00:19:07
Speaker
That doesn't exist in CAD. It does exist in the drawing because I manually typed it in. And then it just exists in CAM via tribal knowledge and skill effectively. Yeah. That's a good point. And I mean, effectively, we're only looking at two parts that tolerance stack. I mean, in our knives, maybe a couple more.
00:19:35
Speaker
I haven't spent a lot of time doing deep dives on tolerance stacks on our parts to figure out those exact ranges. If this is up by two tenths and that's up by two tenths and that's up by two tenths and that's up by two tenths, then you're off by a thou, which is maybe too much.
00:19:55
Speaker
I can imagine on a big, more complex nuclear reactor or airplane or something, F-16 fighter, it's like wild, the tolerance stacks. Yeah, I saw there was a WhatsApp message this morning about how apparently somebody in the Air Force is spending high five figures on a baggie of air, of ball bearings. Do you see that? No. Yeah, I didn't really read on it, but there's some, it looks like a congressional hearing that
00:20:23
Speaker
It looks like it was a, what do you call it? Like a witch hunt type of thing where they're just dressing somebody down, but it's kind of like, why is the, it's like the hospital, it's like, why is the hospital spending $220 on the tub, a tuba Neosporin that's $2 at Walmart? But then it's like, I don't know, who knows what, you know, NDT and remakes and certifications and process validation, these bearings have to go through. Yeah, I go. Yeah.
Blade Show Preparations
00:21:02
Speaker
So we've, we are also prepping for blade show, which is in like five weeks. That's good. One, two, three, four, maybe six weeks. I don't know. Um, yeah, it's going to be, it's going to be here fast. So we're, we're trying to make some nice fancy stuff. We're trying to, I want to get the integral done so that I can bring some to blade show to sell. It'd be awesome. Yeah. So I'm, I'm shooting for that. Um,
00:21:28
Speaker
And we're getting there making progress every day, which is good. Awesome. It's like, I was telling the team at our Monday meeting, I was like, I know I've been saying the end of the month for about five months now, but end of April is coming up soon to have this thing done.
00:21:42
Speaker
I'm impressed like you've seen when you're here, like it's- Yeah, you're one of the few people in the world that got to see it so far. It's really coming together. I think I made some tweaks even since coming to see you last week, new stop pins and such where it actually feels much better. I think I had a soft blade when I was with you, so it felt like spongy and
00:22:05
Speaker
Now I have a heat treated blade in it that's been lapped a little bit and better stop pins and it just pops so much harder and it feels, it's getting there. Eric's been skeptical too because he feels some of the prototypes. He's like, it doesn't feel like it needs to. I was like, I know, I know. Just step by step by step. I showed him the latest one. He's like, it's starting to feel like it needs to. I can see it now. Good, good.
00:22:29
Speaker
So in talking with you, it occurs to me one of the differences about us bringing a product to market and the difficulties of it. Some of it is a topic we already covered about. We know more and we have processes and teams and equipment, blah, blah, blah. So I don't want to repeat myself on that. And that's all kind of, I think, self-evident. The other difference that just occurred to me is also
00:22:51
Speaker
were in such a different place. Because when I was doing strike park, or you were in your garage doing the first knife, there was nothing else. Like, like it was kind of like, I don't have any revenue or any money, or any distractions until this one thing I'm doing is saleable. Like that's true. And so that's actually a wonderful place to be in because sure, you're hungry, but you also you have nothing else, you have nothing else to worry about now.
00:23:17
Speaker
notwithstanding the engineering and expectations internally around how we build designs and ship a product and the hope that if we launch it, it actually sells lots of them and not just back in strike market, we got one sale every two months, we were ecstatic and you could hand pack the order and deal with it and so forth. But it's also kind of like, for better or worse, we are
00:23:40
Speaker
The operations in the business that we have is certainly more than self-sustaining right now from a financial and revenue and business standpoint. I don't want to say it changes the hustle because I feel like that would be significant let down to say that I'm complacent, but the reality is in
00:24:00
Speaker
you know, take puck chuck if I had nothing else to do and no other money coming in, you're darn right. Everything in energy would be focused on getting this product out. Yes. Right. Like and you have a really good point. And that's a part of the reason why this knife has taken me so long. It's because I have other responsibilities. Yeah, trying to spend significant time with my family and my kids and trying to spend, you know, keep the business running and
00:24:25
Speaker
you know, moving forward and all the hurdles and fires I got to put out and machines I got to fix and all the other projects and this, you know, from the outside, it may seem like this is the only thing that's important.
00:24:36
Speaker
to me right now. Even internally, some of the guys are like, why aren't you working more on that? Because I have other things that need to get done too. And so constantly battling that fight of choosing to eliminate all of the distractions to work on this thing, because it is most important. But it's not always most important. Sometimes other things pop up. But that said, as you were going on, I remember myself 10, 12, 14 years ago.
00:25:06
Speaker
Well, I did only have, you know, make the Norseman sell the Norseman. I remember distracting myself with all kinds of other things that at the time I'm too busy. I'm too busy to get this done. And part of it's my personality, but part of it's just, uh,
00:25:26
Speaker
I don't know, lots of stuff to do. You got to fix a machine, you got to design a fixture, you got to test how cool it is, you got to play with a new tool, you got to research, you got to test something out and it all takes you away from doing the thing, the task at hand. Making videos, emailing customers, all that stuff.
00:25:46
Speaker
It's all important. Guys at all stage of business, whether it's just starting out or as mature as us or even way more mature than us, we're like our business are in adolescence stage. They're teenagers. They feel mature, but they could be a lot more.
00:26:07
Speaker
Yeah, there's always those. Yeah, busyness distraction. The subtlety I was trying to convey is also is the opposite in a positive way. That's also negative, which is that you guys are selling Norseman saga and rasks every day. Yeah, exactly. It's money coming in. So it's also not like you're complacent or not hungry or not want to hustle. But the reality is it's also like, you know, yeah, but we we're doing fine. And we got to keep that up as well. Yeah. And yeah, we probably make
00:26:34
Speaker
more money a day than I made the first few years in business. It's just the way it is now. It's amazing. But yeah, cancer has dropped everything to do something new, even though I would want to. I was in the shop. Everybody else had taken off the other night. And I was walking around. I was thinking of all the things I have to do. And I was like, man, I just want to spend like a year in here with no distractions. I would get so much stuff done. I'm like, reality is I don't want to do that.
00:27:03
Speaker
It would be freeing, just to be able to take everything off my box in my list and just do it all. I just want it all done. But reality is I have to choose, I have to pick and choose. Have you thought about doing a staggered shift where you only come in for like the last two or three hours of when everybody else is there? Sometimes that is how it works, yeah. Yeah.
00:27:31
Speaker
You spend the morning with the kids. The kids are homeschooled right now. So I do kind of the morning homeschool. And then sometimes I'll roll in around noon, you know, get four or five hours with the guys and then stay a couple hours later or come back after dinner, whatever. So it's sort of staggering, at least for me. And it kind of works. You know, sometimes it's nice to have two hours in the shop after everybody takes off and I just,
00:27:54
Speaker
pure focus, get done what I need to get done, but there's also a huge value of me being around with the rest of the team too. Yeah, sure.
Work-Life Balance Reflections
00:28:03
Speaker
I don't know. I don't have a perfect scenario. Cloning machine, you know, life and I are working on that. Time machine too. Well, speaking of machines, I bought a new machine this morning.
00:28:16
Speaker
bought another bamboo. Number three. And to be honest, I did resist it a little bit because preparatory span, just don't, let's be frugal, but we use the thing so much and Alex has his own, which has totally been a great call.
00:28:36
Speaker
And the one here, like sometimes I'll just want to print something quick. Sometimes I want to print something that's long and somebody else is using it or vice versa. And I just realized, okay, I need my own. That way the other one can be general purpose for a shop. And I actually think I'm going to, I thought about putting it in my office. I think I'm actually going to leave it at home because I can always print. I live so close. I could print at home and go grab it if I really needed it. And the one here is busy. And for the stuff I want to print,
00:29:01
Speaker
We're almost now, I want to say we have a print schedule, but I know so much so I want to do over the next month of printing that it's going to be easier for me to print it, let it print during the day, come home, switch it out, and then I have another one print overnight and I'm home. It's like, okay, this actually is huge. A bit more control. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's cool. I'm happy about that. I like that. Yeah. Ours is in a weird place where it might sit for a month and never get used and then it gets super busy and everybody's like,
00:29:30
Speaker
Because I've briefly thought about buying a second one. We're not at the point, or a third one, I guess. Eric's got his own. We've got one in the machine shop here. Yeah. Thought about buying a second one for the machine shop. We're not there yet. But at some point, once more people start using it more and more, whatever.
00:29:43
Speaker
And I actually really thought about buying the A1 because most of what I do is single filament, but there's enough things where having the multi is nice for some of the great example of stuff I want to print going forward is more of the great affinities that have the built-in labels where the labels benefit from being a different color. Plus, if ours here breaks, now I've got an identical backup. Yeah, that does help. Yeah.
00:30:11
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, update on the nut runners. Um, we have one company looked really promising, but they effectively don't have a, um, 35 foot pound, like a quote unquote big tool solution for us that would be used for the mod vices. So, um, I really wanted to go with one company for both tools, just for obviously continuity reasons and so forth. Both tools, meaning a high and low torque. So one tool would be a pretty low
00:30:40
Speaker
Torque, meaning it can be a handheld tool. The torque requirements aren't enough to, I think, where the operator would be uncomfortable using it in their own handheld. The peak is 90-inch pounds. It's not much. There's three ranges there. One of the tools that we looked at is awesome. It's a
00:30:59
Speaker
It can handle all three torque ranges. It has a bit tray, a little bit of a price, but a bit tray where when you pull out the Torx 20 bit, it adjusts to the value you preset for Torx 20. And when you pull the Torx 25, the tool electronically updates to that Torx value. That's the kind of stuff I love. The problem was that tool
00:31:18
Speaker
plus that same company who does have a 35 foot pound tool, which would be mounted to a linear arm that would soak up the torque. So the operator's not taking that in their own upper body. Those two tools together were, I think like 25 grand. Which is like, I'm willing to spend money on it, but that doesn't make any sense. So, I want to talk to one other company because I still, I still love this, but,
00:31:46
Speaker
We don't need transducer level accuracy. Our torque values could be plus or minus 5%. Heck, they could probably even be plus or minus 10%. It's more just about automating the torquing of them. Yeah. So mixed results for now. Interesting.
00:32:03
Speaker
But it's good. I think you're starting to accomplish what you wanted, you know, getting good feedback from people. What is the keyword I'm missing that I'm looking for? What are the companies that I don't know exist? You know, you know, the big ones like Ingersoll makes that really expensive one. What else is out there? Yeah, I like it. Yeah. I don't want this to drag on forever on the flip side.
Nut Runner Tool Exploration
00:32:25
Speaker
I'm not willing to compromise. Like I want a
00:32:28
Speaker
I want a top-mounted corded tool. That way, when you hang it from a tool balancer on the small one, the cord's going up. The cord's not going down by your feet. And you want it to... Yeah, I'm just... Yeah, I figured it out. You don't need to data log every torque value and every operator and every time and date and the temperature outside. Yeah, we don't need to do that now. I don't foresee doing that. I don't even actually want to count because the counting thing is...
00:32:58
Speaker
As much as it's interesting to know like, okay, it's gonna start and it's gonna count and tell you a green light when you've torqued 24 screws. Most of them
00:33:08
Speaker
There's nothing stopping you from accidentally torquing one screw 24 times and it giving you a green light. It's a good point. Unless you also get encoders on the linear motion arm, in which case it won't count until you move it, which that, again, I totally get this. If you're a machine builder, car builder, but for us, like we've done this horizontal twice a day for two and a half years, then we've missed a spreading once. Like it's just some of those just operator, uh, focus. Yeah. So more to come. Good.
00:33:42
Speaker
When last October-ish, I drove to Chicago and went to the Kern Open House and made a quick little video there. I had a super good time.
00:33:54
Speaker
Adam the Machinist and I and Dave Forsyce also scurried off to Lapmaster and did a full several hour long tour of Lapmaster and I got to film and we've been busy here so we haven't had a chance to put that video together but I had my guy Ryan at least put all the files into a Google Drive folder so I can review them and like see them and maybe have somebody else edit them or something. So I was kind of poking through it yesterday and I was like,
00:34:24
Speaker
OK, this video needs to go together. It's going to be like an hour long and super boring. But for the people who like laughing and flatness, it's going to be amazing. And the old guy there, Joe Flash, been there for like 30 to 50 years, something like that. He knew everything. Yeah. And it was just me and Adam poking his brain and like, OK, well, what about this? What does this do? It was great. So I'll get that video put together at some point. It's really cool. But I was looking for a very specific thing.
00:34:54
Speaker
And I remember seeing it and I wanted to see the video again because I know I filmed it a lot. So Lapmaster makes this hand lapping table that's like a little square with a roll of diamond paper in the front and it like a paper towel roll.
00:35:09
Speaker
And you roll the diamond paper on top of this lapped flat square 12 by 12 cast iron base. And then you do your hand lapping on top of that with refreshable diamond paper. Love it. So you don't have slurry and things like that. And I remember him telling me that that 12 by 12 square of cast iron is lapped, not perfectly flat. There's a 1 10th dome to it.
00:35:32
Speaker
Like one tenth across 12 inches. How do you even... That's awesome. How do you measure that? Yeah. How do you... Well, you... Yeah. They're the experts, obviously. But yeah. So I remember that. I wanted to see it. I do have video on that and start sharing that because it was really cool. And I'm thinking to myself, how much is that thing? It's probably stupid expensive. It's probably three grand or something, but I could probably make that. Yeah, yeah. Does it need to be a tenth dish?
00:35:59
Speaker
I believe the dish, the concave convex is as simple as a natural occurrence between your, your cutting lap and your conditioning lap. Which ones on top. Right. And depending on for hand lapping to cast iron lapping plates, that can be the case. Machine lapping is different. The plate goes up or down depending.
Lapping Machine Upgrade Plans
00:36:25
Speaker
So, but yeah, we've been doing more.
00:36:28
Speaker
I mean, not more machine lapping, same amount we always do, but we actually switched operators around, um, on machine lapping, which has been really interesting. Steve's been doing it for three years now, four maybe. Um, and then he was off for a week. So, uh, Angelo and Grayson took over and they, they've been lapping since and they're like,
00:36:50
Speaker
I don't want to say enjoying the process because it's a time consuming like messy process, but, um, really awesome for me to be able to see them jump in and be able to do this relatively complex, uh, precise task. Um, that's, you know, operated by somebody else. Yeah, I know that's great. It's really awesome. Um, not only that, but I have some massive upgrades I'm going to be making to our lapping machine, which is super exciting. Like right now it's a big cast iron.
00:37:19
Speaker
cast iron composite plate, where you spray the diamonds on top, you hope that they stick into the plate, and you have enough lubricant and lapping slurry that when you're lapping your part, it floats on these little fingernails of diamonds sticking up and it laps your part. And that mostly works well
00:37:39
Speaker
has some issues. There's a company I found about six months ago called Puron that makes stick on lapping pads that go 24 inch pad that sticks onto your lapping plate that has abrasive built into it like a super fancy sandpaper.
00:37:57
Speaker
and has your diamond particles built into this plate. And from what I'm seeing and from what I've tested, it should cut twice as fast, super clean with a higher RA surface finish, like better. And like wins, wins, wins, wins, wins, wins, wins.
00:38:15
Speaker
So we'd get rid of the bottles that dispense the liquid. Yep. You still need a lubricant. So you're spraying on a coolant, let's say. So instead of being a relatively dry process, like a misted process, it's not going to be a wet process. But all that wet swarf is going to flow down the drain.
00:38:36
Speaker
and into a filter bag that I'm going to do, and then through a pump that I bought, and then through a bag filter, and then I'm making a cooling system, basically, a filter cooling system. So that's kind of one of the challenges.
00:38:49
Speaker
But I had these pads custom ordered, the Squadro pads. I got two 15 microns and one 3 micron, just to have something super fine. And they weren't cheap. And I've been sitting on them for quite a few months. And it's like, guys, this week, this week, it's going by the end of this week. Because I think it's going to reduce operator time significantly. And it's going to increase output and just quality and consistency. And I'm super excited.
00:39:16
Speaker
How long what? Do those pads last? I don't know. And they couldn't even really answer because they're like, how much are you using it? I don't know. I'm hoping months. That's not going to last a year. Yeah. I'm hoping months though. Interesting. So it took like, I want to say five weeks to get them ordered because they make it to your size. Oh. So I ordered two because I'm like,
00:39:37
Speaker
It better last for more than five weeks. If we burn up the first one and then we get put on the second one and then we order more, it has to arrive before. But yeah, because operating that machine is not free either. The lapping slurry is many hundreds of dollars per bottle of diamonds.
00:39:57
Speaker
So even though these pads are expensive, it's probably a similar cost overall. But I'm super excited. Good. Yeah. It's been dipping my toe back into the flatness lapping world in and out and out. And I've had these pads for months. And I was like, guys, I want to run. I want to test it out. If it doesn't work, we unpeel it and go back to normal. Yeah, we're right. No big deal. But we need, like, Angelo's
00:40:29
Speaker
concern that we need to be ahead enough on lapping because this is going to take days of downtime to, uh, to test. Sure, sure, sure, sure. You know, so, so they're, they're working on getting ahead.
00:40:39
Speaker
And that's the problem with a reliable process and a new process. It's like you don't want to stop the reliable process because it works. But you also want to drive innovation. Yeah. Try new things. And that's where I'm coming at all the time. It's like, guys, we've got to try new. We've got to measure this. We've got to test this. We've got to do this. And they're like, but it works. Yeah, but it could work better. Am I crazy that you have? I thought you had two lapping machines. No. Just one? OK. Just one and a whole lot of hand lapping stuff.
00:41:07
Speaker
We do have a really nice surface grinder. Have you heard about it?
00:41:11
Speaker
Yeah, I'm sorry. For a split second, I was thinking of the Tormach one. I'm like, John, I sold mine. Then you were afraid of the hack for the Okamoto. Yes. Yeah, yes. We do still have our Tormach surface grinder. I just stole the dial indicator from it the other day. Actually, I wanted to mention, so at your open house, I bought a little cheap granite base with a metal rod, like an indicator stand, for $7.50 at the open house. And I was like, I don't know what I'm going to need this for, but I'm going to need this. Come back three days later, I'm like,
00:41:38
Speaker
I know exactly what I need it for. I have a perfect use for it. Great. So sometimes our blades warp in heat treat ever so slightly, you know, hill or lake. And so I put a 10th indicator, like dial indicator on it.
00:41:54
Speaker
And now the guys in heat treat, um, can put a blade on and push down and measure that warp, that bow, um, find the high spot instantly. And we didn't really have this before, you know, people would look for light. Um,
00:42:10
Speaker
We use the light boxes all the time, but this gives them a number and I was like, okay guys, I am requesting that you track the warp of every blade through every process of heat treat from hot to quench to cryo to temper. Just do it for a couple batches and we'll see if we see any trends. Is one of these processes quench or cryo or temper
00:42:34
Speaker
massively making it better or worse, the work that we're receiving, because any warp going to lapping just causes a pain in the butt. It's just makes life difficult. And so is there a way to cut it off at the source or at least identify, you know, more data what's happening. So yeah, so thank you for the indicator stand. You are welcome. That's exactly the point. It's going to be good.
00:42:58
Speaker
And, you know, I bought it and I'm driving it home and I put it in my shop on the bench of like all the other old tools that I'm not really going to use. And I'm like, did I just buy some more stuff that I don't need? Do you know what? Preparatory purchase, baby. It's part of three day turnaround times. I'm really happy about that.
00:43:15
Speaker
I'm waiting for the moment we've been doing this where I'm like, Oh my God, why did I sell that? I need it now. But it hasn't happened. And I don't care because we're moving forward. Yeah, exactly. But speaking of old ish things, I have found some inspiration to pick back up on Johnny five. Yeah, I heard a little bit about that.
00:43:35
Speaker
Yeah, it worked out kind of all great because obviously we were all looking at him because we were over there for the sale. Yeah. I'm going to move him back into my office. And look, the excuse is we just moved on. There's no point in elaborate. That's kind of what I figured. Yeah. But the last guy who was working on it was a great intern who's now off at college and I didn't do a good enough job at
00:43:55
Speaker
getting a transition away from where he left off. And a project like this can be daunting in scope, even though he's so close to be done, it's also like, where do you go? Well, I was actually talking with another guy who's in the builder's club for him, and he made a really good point that I'm embarrassed that I had to be reminded of, which is that like, just pick a little section, like just work on the two inches of the next section. And, you know, even if I have to print some parts as a surrogate before we would machine them, like that's a great way to modularize or break it down.
00:44:24
Speaker
Well, and your access to printing and experience with printing is so much more than it was four years ago. I assume you're still in touch with the intern that is off at college, right? Yeah. Could be. So if you gave me questions or whatever. Yeah. Cool. So I'm going to... That's fun. Yeah. I'm going to work on it a little more, which would be awesome. And it's one of those projects
00:44:47
Speaker
Just add some life to the fun of all of this. Not only for yourself and your team, but for us, for viewers watching. People want you to make this robot. They want to just breathe some life and some funness into manufacturing. See, it can be fun too. I'm enjoying myself doing this.
00:45:09
Speaker
Well, and that's what I got, uh, Williams Facebook game last night. I was like, I heard you're building a robot. And I just mentioned it. He's like, why? And it's kind of like, I'm always reminded of that, uh, question. I think it was Sir Edmund Hillary, the guy who climbed Everest when they, I think it was his quote when, when people asking that, he's like, because they're there. Like that's why we climb mountains. I'm like, I'm building it because.
00:45:30
Speaker
Well, maybe that's not the right direction. I'm building it because as a kid, this inspired me. The idea that there's all these aspects of CAD, project design, machining stuff, 3D printing, engineering, hydraulics, automation, robots, RC. All of these things are encapsulated in this one thing is what it's all about. Yep. And somebody could remind you going forward, building that robot that I noticed watching you five years ago start to build it.
00:46:00
Speaker
fact that this was made in the 80s for a movie. And I mean, it's a lot of work. I made a number of them in months too. It's really impressive.
00:46:11
Speaker
Yeah, I would love to hear you go deeper into that topic at some point. Even just riff on a video and show parts and be like, guys, in the 80s, a bunch of nerds built this in five months for a movie, not for a space program. But you know what? They were kind of bringing this topic to a full circle and disclosure. They were not running
00:46:35
Speaker
companies. They were tasked with being whatever the term is, model maker, set maker, prop maker. Your job today, Steve, is to make this wrist. Okay. I have nothing else to do. Making my wrist. Yeah. It's kind of like that movie The Martian with Mark Wahlberg where the whole NASA team or jet propulsion team or whatever it is, it's like, we're not going home until he's home. It's like, this is our life now.
00:47:01
Speaker
I have no other job as the guy to then to figure out how to make, you know, water with plants or something like, I'm not worried about anything else. I need water. Good. Cool, man. Good. See you next week. Yeah, that's good. Have a great day.