The AMT (Association for Manufacturing Technology) report showed respectable gains for the manufacturing tool market. New tool orders totaled $507.91 million in March, a 30.4 percent rise over February orders, and 3.24 percent more than the $491.96 million in orders from March 2012. Combined with February’s revised total of $389.37 million, 2013 has seen $1.2 billion in new sales, a slight dip compared to the total for the same period in 2012 and the result of contraction in January.

AMT President Doug Woods noted that the growth seen in March is attributable to growing demand in consumer markets, which are buoying industrial demand.

Northeast Region

Total: $71.99 million

Percent change from February: 31.8 percent

Percent change from March 2012: -3.2 percent

Year-to-date (YTD): $177.37 million

Percent change from 2012: -6.5 percent

Southeast Region

Total: $36.07 million

Percent change from February: 20.2 percent

Percent change from March 2012: -38.7 percent

YTD:  $103.65 million

Percent change from 2012: -21.1 percent

North Central-East Region

Total: $145.53 million

Percent change from February: 29.4 percent

Percent change from March 2012: 19.1 percent

YTD: $363.91 million

Percent change from 2012: 7.4 percent

North Central-West Region

Total: $105.93 million

Percent change from February: 30.1 percent

Percent change from March 2012: 21.4 percent

YTD: $259.46 million

Percent change from 2012: 6.5 percent

South Central Region

Total: $66.04 million

Percent change from February: 15.0 percent

Percent change from March 2012: -18.4 percent

YTD: $197.00 million

Percent change from 2012: -27.9 percent

West Region

Total: $82.36 million

Percent change from February: 54.2 percent

Percent change from March 2012: 20.5 percent

YTD: $176.65 million

Percent change from 2012: 4.6 percent

–Brian Lane

At EASTEC 2013, small business owners, shop workers, and manufacturing industry professionals were able to meet and discuss tooling and technology solutions to contemporary industry’s most important issues. In the exclusive podcast above, IMT Machining Journal’s Brian Lane speaks with Tom Scotton, Director, Modeling & Simulation at the Connecticut Center for Advanced Technology (CCAT), about the importance of technology in growing your manufacturing business, as well as using MTConnect and metrology solutions.

–Brian Lane

1. Simulation is becoming easier to use and more common earlier in the design process. This is good in that it enables more iterative design cycles but risky in that it places simulation tools in the hands of people who may not have all the training they need. That yin-yang will drive more structure around the process of simulation to ensure verification and validation. There’s a worthwhile conversation about that in the comment threads of this post about Ansys.

2. Mobility. Everybody wants mobility, but so far computing-on-the-go seems to have bypassed the engineering department. The ability of Windows 8 to run real CAD systems may mark a turning point in the utility of mobile platforms.

3. Cloud. The software vendors see a path to store data for their customers and thereby offer user-based pricing and automated backups along with much easier collaboration. From my conversations at COFES, the vendors may be ahead of their customers in adopting this data-sharing model. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

4. Sharing of pre-solved solutions. Rather than restricting access to solutions, things like materials properties tables, simple CAD models, low-level calculators, simulation use cases, etc, may all be stored and shared in wiki-like open environments allowing faster progress to be made at the margins.

John Hayes is president of Engineering.com. This article was originally published on Engineering.com and is republished with permission. For more stories like this, visit Engineering.com.

Robert Kravontka, a business growth advisor at CONNSTEP, discusses the importance of registering with a standard for shops big and small. To find out more about the 2013 CONNSTEP Conference that Kravontka mentions in the video, click here. Visit http://www.connstep.org.

Axis New England Sales Engineer Josh Gustafson demonstrates for IMT Machining Journal the ease with which to program Universal Robots‘ UR-5, a collaborative, safe robotic arm we’ve written about in the past. Visit http://www.universal-robots.com and http://www.axisne.com.

Hanan Fishman, president of the PartMaker division of Delcam, explains the compatibility of the new PartMaker 2013 software with a wide variety of machine tool brands and machine types, as well as its usability for shop personnel. See http://www.partmaker.com for more.

–Brian Lane

IMT Machining Journal’s Brian Lane learns from Keith Brady, regional manager for Flow International, about the capabilities of flow waterjet cutting as an alternative method to conventional machining. Brady demonstrates the supersonic abrasion process in cutting a 0.25-in-thick aluminum part.

For more on Flow International, see http://www.flowwaterjet.com/

IMT Machining Journal’s Brian Lane discusses Absolute Haitian plastic injection molding with the company’s chief engineer, Mike Ortolano. Absolute Haitian is at EASTEC 2013 to showcase molding machinery to potential full-service shops that both machine injection molds and run part production for customers.

For more information on Absolute Haitian, see http://www.absolutehaitian.com/

IMT Machining Journal’s Brian Lane speaks with Nick Giannotte, a vice president at Mitsubishi, about its latest waterjet cutting technology, notably its versatility for job shops.

For more on Mitsubishi, see http://www.mitsubishi-world.com.

For more from IMT Machining Journal, go to http://www.thomasnet.com/journals/machining/.

You can also view continuous IMT Machining Journal coverage by following us on Twitter, @BrianL_TN or @MachiningTN.

IMT Machining Journal’s Brian Lane talks with Bruce Hamilton, president of GBMP (Greater Boston Manufacturing Partnership) about the importance of lean manufacturing principles for customers, employees, and managers.

Find out more from GBMP at http://gbmp.org/
Follow Hamilton’s blog, the Old Lean Dude, at http://oldleandude.com/
Follow EASTEC 2013 coverage at http://www.thomasnet.com/journals/machining/

You can also view continuous IMT Machining Journal coverage by following us on Twitter, @BrianL_TN or @MachiningTN

–Brian Lane

On May 22, Mazak will present a free 30-min webinar at 2 p.m. ET on advanced horizontal machining techniques for titanium, a key aerospace material. Topics include how machine tool builders are adapting their equipment and products for processing titanium, as well as details about two Mazak machining systems: the Nexus 6800 HM (for hard metals) and Mega 8800. Both are designed for accuracy and productivity in the heavy-duty machining of specialty materials. Registration for the webinar is at www.mazakusa.com/webinar.

Next month, Mazak will discuss machining systems for the energy market at a two-day open house at its Southwest Technology Center in Houston.

The Mazak Southwest Technology Center will highlight the company’s machine tool applications for the energy industry (and other end-uses) at an open house in Houston, June 5-6, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. CT. Systems on display include the Nexus 6800, vertical machining centers Nexus 700E and 510C, Vortex 1060V/8, slant-turn Nexus 600M, quick-turn Nexus 450M, Orbitec 20, Powermaster, and Integrex j-300.

Most of these systems are engineered for large parts and high productivity.

Mazak will also discuss ways to reduce manufacturing costs and present a new productivity program.

Registration for the open house is at www.mazakusa.com.

Students like the one above are able to find workforce placement at local businesses through the Orleans Career and Technical Education Center Precision Machining Technology program. Credit: Orleans Center.

The Orleans Career and Technical Education Center has forged relationships with local western New York businesses to help find potential employment opportunities for the students in its Precision Machine Technology program.

Instructor Bill Rakonczay has developed Capstoning, a partnership between the school and local businesses to get trained students into workplaces. Qualified students from the Medina, N.Y., technical college find placement into local manufacturing facilities, where they work four days a week and earn pay as well as school credits. Capstoning provides foundational job experience to the students and much-needed skilled help to the businesses.

“Many of these companies cannot find enough trained workers to fill their needs,” Rakonczay told Metro WNY. “Most of my students do not need to worry about what they are going to do after graduation because they already have jobs lined up in their senior year. If students are looking for a program they can take while in high school that will get them on a good career path, I would highly recommend this program.”

Students said they benefit greatly from the working experience, as they gain a professional edge and valuable education.

“It’s really nice because they have different machines than what we have in class and the people there are very helpful with showing me how to work them,” student Mike Wilson said. “I have already been offered a job at graduation.”

—Brian Lane

Subtitled “Research and development,” the book highlights many of the burgeoning technologies in industrial giants like the U.S., Japan, Germany, and the U.K. The book uses research articles, review articles, and case studies to analyze the fundamentals behind traditional machining methods like turning, milling, drilling, and grinding, while also exploring techniques still gaining acceptance in the manufacturing sector.

The book looks at electrical discharge machining (EDM), laser beam machining (LBM), abrasive water jet machining (AWJM), ultrasonic machining (USM), and other recently developed or adopted machining technologies.

“Machining and machine-tools,” which will be available in digital and physical editions on June 28, follows Materials and Surface Engineering and Mechatronics and Manufacturing Engineering in Woodhead Publishing’s Mechanical Engineering Series. For a broader list of Woodhead Publishing’s industrial textbooks, see here.

—Brian Lane

Author Dave Edstrom tells the open system’s story in MTConnect: To Measure is To Know, which covers the development of MTConnect from a conflation of theories about networking and open principles to a working standard present in factories around the world. Former computer industry professional at Sun Microsystems Edstrom notes that MTConnect is well-positioned to improve industrial performance for small shops to large conglomerates.

“Think of MTConnect as simply the Bluetooth of manufacturing that makes it easy to get information off your manufacturing equipment,” he said in a statement. “MTConnect is not an application, but it makes it very easy for applications to read data in a common and universal format. ‘Different Devices, Common Connection’ is what we say about MTConnect.”

The narrative is addressed to manufacturers who want a better understanding of open systems and the benefits they can provide for manufacturing.

“It is first a book about how to properly think about open systems and technology and, most importantly, how to apply that thinking in manufacturing followed by the specifics on MTConnect,” Edstrom said. “This is both a business and a technical book.”

John Byrd, former president of AMT (The Association for Manufacturing Technology), blurbed the book by noting the epochal shift in manufacturing connectivity promised by MTConnect.

“MTConnect will be more important in the 21st century for manufacturing than CNC was for manufacturing in the 20th century.”

You can find MTConnect: To Measure is To Know in online book retailers like Amazon in paperback and digital formats.

—Brian Lane