All Features
Barbara A. Cleary
Approaching the end of the school year means focusing on graduation rates, dropout rates, and other data suggesting trends for students. Opportunities for considering statistics abound, but one must examine the way that these statistics are actually used by asking the right questions about the…
LaserLinc Inc.
(LaserLinc: Dayton, OH) -- LaserLinc Inc., a United States manufacturer of technology for precision measurement of diameter, ovality, wall thickness, concentricity, eccentricity, and inside diameter, is pleased to introduce the TLAser1240 scanning laser micrometer, a new single-axis diameter gauge…
Bruce Hamilton
Many moons ago, when I was just getting started on my lean journey, I visited a large automotive supplier to benchmark pull systems. My own factory had started a pilot kanban between two work centers and I was hoping to gain some insight from a more experienced source.
To my disappointment, when…
Marposs
(Marposs: Auburn Hills, MI) -- Marposs will introduce its latest generation Optoquick flexible, precision shop-floor shaft measuring system at IMTS 2016 in booths E-5516 and S-8719. The Optoquick system utilizes non-contact optical scanning to provide rapid and accurate measurements while the part…
Ken Levine
How do you determine the “worst case” scenario for a process? Is it by assuming the worst case for each process task or step? No. The reason is that the probability of every step having its worst case at the same time is practically zero. What we’re looking for is a value that will occur a very…
DeFelsko
(DeFelsko: Ogdensburg, NY) -- DeFelsko has introduced the new PosiTector SHD Shore Hardness Durometer for measuring the indentation hardness of non-metallic materials such as polymers, elastomers, and rubbers. In the corrosion industry, durometers are commonly used to ensure proper curing of…
Ken Voytek
In a recent post, I examined the differences in productivity across small and large manufacturing firms, and noted that there were differences across manufacturers in terms of size. But it’s also clear from the literature that productivity differs across companies even in the same industry.
Why…
MCMA
(MCMA: Ann Arbor, MI) -- The Motion Control and Motor Association (MCMA), the global trade association for the motion control and motor industry, recently announced that online registration is open for the annual Technical Conference (TechCon), which will be held October 11–13, 2016, in New…
Annette Franz
A couple weeks ago, I wrote a post about emotionally unavailable customers. Hat tip to James Lawther for inspiring me to actually flip the tables here and think about emotionally challenged employees, instead.
The question I posed in response to his comment on that post was: Why do we transform…
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
An improved titanium alloy—stronger than any commercial titanium alloy currently on the market—gets its strength from the novel way atoms are arranged to form a special nanostructure. For the first time, researchers have been able to see this alignment and then manipulate it to make the strongest…
Sunnen Products Co.
(Sunnen: St. Louis, MO) -- Sunnen’s new SVL-2115 automated lapping machine brings increased productivity and part consistency to what is traditionally a manual process. Based on the same machine platform as the SV-2100 honing system, the SVL-2115 provides single-setup processing of hydraulic…
Delcam
(Delcam: Birmingham, UK) -- Delcam, an Autodesk company since 2014, continues to improve its software to help companies whenever they need to increase productivity, reduce lead times, or improve quality and consistency.
Visitors to IMTS, held in Chicago Sept. 12–17, 2016, will see at booth E-3222…
Steve Melito
How competitive is American manufacturing? By the year 2020, the United States is projected to take the top spot in the Global Manufacturing Competitiveness Index (GMCI), a multiyear research platform from Deloitte and the Council on Competitiveness.
The 2016 GMCI surveyed more than 500 of the…
Fred Schenkelberg
A fault tree analysis (FTA) is a logical, graphical diagram that starts with an unwanted, undesirable, or anomalous state of a system. The diagram then lays out the many possible faults, and combinations of faults, within the subsystems, components, assemblies, software, and parts comprising the…
Michelle LaBrosse
Ihave studied systems dynamics modeling for three decades. What I’ve experienced first-hand is that when you establish several key core values, you can create an entire self-replicating system for your organization.
I experimented with this idea first with Cheetah Learning, where our three core…
William A. Levinson
ISO 9001:2015, Clause 4.2—“Understanding the needs and expectations of interested parties” requires the organization to determine the “requirements of these interested parties that are relevant to the quality management system.” When customers block an organization’s content, it is a sure sign…
More than 313 million global work-related accidents occur each year, according to the International Labour Organization, with a high percentage of those accidents resulting in significant time away from work. Each accident bears a personal and financial cost for the worker and the employer. Yet,…
Sam Sharter
The tragic shooting in Orlando brought dozens of victims to emergency rooms. Even now, several of those people are still clinging to life. Many across the nation are praying for them and the other victims. Without quick response and high-quality emergency medical care, many more than the 49 already…
Debby Newslow
Standard operating procedures, or SOPs, are critical to quality assurance. Frequently, in an operation with many associates, each one does his or her job as well as possible (because no one wants to do a bad job). Some people, however, will do tasks differently than others—and usually they think…
Argonne National Laboratory
Humans spend a lot of time creating things, and these activities drive a huge amount of our lives, economically and personally. We’re always in a fight to keep our creations from breaking down. Houses, roads, cars. Power lines and bridges. Solar cells and computers. Batteries. People.
Then there…
3D Systems
(3D Systems: Rock Hill, SC) -- 3D Systems announced today that Bastech, a partner and one-source solution provider for additive manufacturing services and equipment, used 3D Systems’ end-to-end 3D solutions to introduce a new level of simplicity, efficiency, and economy to its conformal cooling…
Johns Hopkins University
More than one-third of Americans say they don’t have enough time in their day to get things done, and the majority of Americans who report not having enough spare time also say they battle stress, reports the Johns Hopkins Health Review.
Busyness is a badge of honor for those who equate a packed…
Greg Fox
Remember the classic science fiction film The Matrix? The dark sunglasses, the leather, computer monitors constantly raining streams of integers (inexplicably in base 10 rather than binary or hexadecimal)? And that mind-blowing plot twist when Neo takes the red pill from Morpheus’ outstretched…
Howard Sklamberg
Globalization is posing challenges for public health. For the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), part of that challenge is the ever-increasing volume and complexity of FDA-regulated products coming to America’s shores.
In fiscal year 2015, there were more than 34 million shipments of FDA-…
Giles Hutchins
Each generation experiences significant change due to innovations, disruptions, and shifting perspectives. These transform our ways of operating and organizing in business and beyond. Yet, it seems we’re now living in a particularly dynamic period, with metamorphic shifts that challenge what we do…