All Features
NIMS
(NIMS: Fairfax, VA) -- The National Institute for Metalworking Skills (NIMS) is pleased to announce that it has launched a new credential to validate an instructor’s or evaluator’s parts inspection skills.
According to Montez King, Executive Director of NIMS, “validating skills has become ever…
Steve Moore
Pickleball is arguably the fastest-growing sport in the United States, especially among baby-boomer retirees. This game is similar to tennis, but is played on a smaller court (44 ft × 20 ft) with a solid paddle and a perforated polymer ball much like a wiffle ball.
Pickleball’s popularity may be…
Jill Barshay, Sasha Aslanian
When Keenan Robinson started college in 2017, he knew the career he wanted. He’d gone to high school in a small town outside Atlanta. His parents had never finished college, and they always encouraged Robinson and his two older siblings to earn degrees. Robinson’s older brother was the first in the…
Ekim Saribardak
Transporting cargo over long distances has always been a logistical nightmare, but when the goods are of a delicate nature, the whole operation becomes significantly more challenging. Perishable foods, chemicals, pharmaceutical products, and other delicate goods all need special treatment during…
Andrew Edman
On factory floors all over the world, 3D printing has quietly moved from a prototyping novelty to an essential tool. Advances in printer technology and material science mean that today’s 3D printed parts are robust enough to hold up to real-world wear and tear, and precise enough for demanding…
Peter Rose
On May 26, 2020, the new European Union Medical Device Regulation (MDR) will finally take effect. By that date, all Class I manufacturers wishing to continue their trading activities within the EU market must have effectively completed the transition from the previous medical device directive and…
Davis Balestracci
As statistical methods become more embedded in everyday organizational quality improvement efforts, I find that a key concept is often woefully misunderstood, if it is even taught at all. W. Edwards Deming distinguished between two types of statistical study, which he called “enumerative” and “…
Simon Côté
The aerospace industry is known for manufacturing parts with critical dimensions and tight tolerances, all of which must undergo demanding inspections. Given the scale of the controls to be carried out on these parts, it is hardly surprising that quality people in the industry prefer to turn to…
(Porta Products Corp.: New Smyrna, FL) -- Porta Performance, a division of Porta Products Corp., announces the creation of Marine Aerodynamics as a product. Over a year in process, the proficiency of Aero Dynamics for the marine industry has come of age.
A proof of concept/case study was…
Belinda Jones
Women who crashed the glass ceiling in male-dominated fields have compelling stories about the trajectory of their careers. These days, I think a lot about those inadvertent role models, thankful for their determination to pursue big dreams so I could pursue mine. Trailblazers like Dr. Bonnie…
Belinda Jones
Change is the only constant in life.” This quote is attributed to Heraclitus, a very influential Greek philosopher from the late sixth century BCE. His time-honored words still hold true in 2019, and change indeed continues to shape the metrology industry. The dynamics of the marketplace are…
Nikon Metrology Inc.
(Nikon Metrology: Brighton, MI) -- Nikon Metrology is proud to support the BMW Group’s body shop at Dingolfing, Germany. As Industry 4.0 introduces a new era of digitalization, BMW has developed a new and innovative, fully automated inline measurement cell for quality control. Featuring the Laser…
FARO
(FARO Technologies: Lake Mary, FL) -- FARO has announced the availability of the Cobalt Design structured-light scanner product family. Structured-light scanning technology uses projected-light patterns with a camera system to capture large areas at once and, as a result, significantly reduces data…
Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence
(Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence: North Kingstown, RI) -- Hexagon’s Manufacturing Intelligence division today launched PC-DMIS 2019 R2, the latest edition of the world’s most popular measurement software. PC-DMIS 2019 R2 introduces Home Page, a new way to interact with PC-DMIS that improves…
Fringe projection techniques offer fast, noncontact measurements of the surface form of manufactured parts. Fringe projection has seen successful implementation in the automotive, aerospace, and medical industries. Recently, advances in fringe projection have reduced the sensitivity of the…
Matthew Ilardo
I am looking forward to another year serving the community of the Coordinate Metrology Society. I would like to encourage our metrology membership to revel in your accomplishments, and expand your horizons in 2020 by taking on something new. Every year the CMS strives to expand its content,…
Mike Richman
For any of you who missed it, CMSC 2019 was, as always, a first-class conference with loads of great content, exciting new product and service offerings, and numerous unique opportunities for knowledge transfer with the leading metrologists in industry and academia.
Taking place July 22–26 at the…
Knowledge at Wharton
From a lone statistician toiling over narrowly defined problems for the marketing department, to a C-level executive overseeing a mission-critical area impacting every function of the company, the meaning of “data and analytics professional” has changed a lot in recent years. A. Charles Thomas’s…
Zach Winn
This story was originally published by MIT News.
Manufacturers are constantly tweaking their processes to get rid of waste and improve productivity. As such, the software they use should be as nimble and responsive as the operations on their factory floors.
Instead, much of the software in today’s…
Natasha Gilbert, Knowable Magazine
This story was originally published by Knowable Magazine.
Alfalfa, oats, and red clover are soaking up the sunlight in long narrow plots, breaking up the sea of maize and soybeans that dominates this landscape in the heart of the U.S. farm belt. The 18 by 85 meter sections are part of an…
The Un-Comfort Zone With Robert Wilson
When I was 7 years old, I went into the woods behind my house, built a fire, then fried an egg over it in an old pie tin. When the egg was done, I ate it. I didn’t even like eggs, but because I had cooked it on my own, it was delicious.
I was so proud of my achievement that I ran inside and told…
Aliyah Kovner
It’s 1 p.m. on a sunny afternoon in July—smack dab in the middle of summer break—and a perfect 75° outside, but Jonathan Park is laser-focused. Though he could be strolling down a beach, or at home browsing social media, this 16-year-old is bent over a lab bench, intently pipetting reagents to run…
Eric Weisbrod
In manufacturing, standardization in production and process control leads to increased profitability and cuts down on many siloed problems that can plague even the most quality-focused organization. But when you have multiple, disparate plants around the country or the globe, standardization can…
David Blustein
On the surface, the well-being of the American worker seems rosy. Unemployment in the United States hovers near a 50-year low, and employers describe growing shortages of workers in a wide array of fields. But looking beyond the numbers tells a different story.
My new book, The Importance of Work…
