All Features
Lauren Dunford
Industry 4.0 has been a hot topic for years now, for good reason: 86 percent of manufacturing C-suites say digital transformation is a priority, and about 91 percent of industrial companies are investing in digital factories. Yet Industry 4.0 has also become a buzzword in many ways, as so many…
Scott Dietz
The manufacturing community has long struggled with finding skilled workers, citing, among other things, the misconceptions that manufacturing jobs underpay, are monotonous, and involve working in dirty factories. With the adoption of Industry 4.0—automation and robotics—the issue is as much about…
(Exact Metrology: Brookfield, Wisconsin) -- Exact Metrology, a division of In-Place Machining Co. and a comprehensive 3D metrology service provider and hardware sales company, recently announced it has become the North American distributor of HandsOnMetrology. HandsOnMetrology.com has been set up…
(Quality Training Portal: Waitsfield, VT) -- Quality Training Portal has announced that by the end of 2022 its entire online training catalog will be available in nine languages in addition to English. The firm’s 20 most popular courses, including AIAG-VDA FMEAs, Basic SPC, APQP, PPAP, and 8D…
Mark Hembree
‘Anyone can hit a home run if they try,” said the great Ty Cobb at the end of the deadball era as Babe Ruth rose to fame in the 1920s. Cobb was unimpressed by Ruth, the Sultan of Swat. “It’s a brute way to approach the game.”
In 2019, Major League Baseball (MLB) seemed to prove Cobb’s point as big…
Bruce Hamilton
With GBMP’s 18th annual Northeast Lean Conference on the horizon, I’m reflecting on our theme, “Amplifying Lean—The Collaboration Effect.” The term collaboration typically connotes an organized attempt by unrelated, even competitive, parties to work together on a common problem; for example, the…
(Sunnen: St. Louis, MO) -- Sunnen Products Co. advances the state of honing technology with the new SV-3000 series vertical honing systems. The SV-3000 features a new Beckhoff-based industrial control with proprietary Sunnen2 software designed to include EtherCAT industrial communication for fast…
Gleb Tsipursky
Forward-looking organizations use hybrid and remote mentoring to solve two of the biggest challenges for that type of work: on-the-job training and integrating junior employees. Yet despite solving this major problem, mentoring programs that pair new staff with senior employees are all too rare.…
Adam Zewe
Scientists and engineers are constantly developing new materials with unique properties that can be used for 3D printing. But figuring out how to print with these materials can be a complex, costly conundrum.
Often, an expert operator must use trial and error—possibly making thousands of prints—to…
Quality Digest
(Ultimation Industries: Roseville, MI) -- Indoor farming is all about maximizing food production per acre. But growers who want to further increase yields should consider growing “up” with the help of conveyor technologies that make use of the available vertical space within a facility, according…
Ken Moon
Henry Ford was onto something.
In 1914, the automaker began paying his factory workers $5 per day for eight hours of work on the assembly line. Although Ford had refined mass production to make it more efficient, he still needed employees to show up and stick around. The generous wage, equivalent…
Catherine Barzler
Falls are a serious public health issue that result in tens of thousands of deaths annually while racking up billions of dollars in healthcare costs. Although there has been extensive research into the biomechanics of falls, most current approaches study how the legs, joints, and muscles act…
Ella Miron-Spektor, Kyle Emich, Linda Argote, Wendy Smith
‘The experience was magical. I had enjoyed collaborative work before, but this was something different,” says Daniel Kahneman of the beginnings of the years-long partnership with fellow psychologist Amos Tversky that culminated in a Nobel Prize in economic sciences three decades later.
What…
NIST
(U.S. Department of Commerce: Washington, D.C.) -- The U.S. Department of Commerce has launched a Job Quality Toolkit, providing strategies and actions to help small-and-medium-sized organizations recruit and retain a high-performing workforce. The toolkit also includes eight case studies of…
Quality Digest
(Siemens: Plano, TX) -- Siemens Digital Industries Software announced that REGENT has adopted the Siemens Xcelerator portfolio of cloud-based software and services to help pioneer a new category of vehicle called the seaglider, a high-speed, zero-emission craft operating exclusively over water to…
Tim Mouw
According to autolist.com, more than 80 percent of cars produced today are white, black, or some shade of gray. It’s not necessarily because bright and bold colors are more difficult to produce and match than their grayscale counterparts. They just take longer to get through the inspiration and…
Susanne Tedrick
No single person, no matter how intelligent or experienced, can understand everything there is to know about a given job. Questions will come up, and when they do, the individual—whether a software developer, project manager, sales engineer, or any other title—needs to have a handle on the specific…
(SAKOR: Owossso, MI) -- SAKOR Technologies, a recognized leader in the area of high-performance dynamometer systems, announces that it recently provided Nexteer Automotive with a dynamometer test system designed to test high speed motors and inverters in hybrid and electric vehicle designs. Nexteer…
(Gryphon Investors: San Francisco) -- Gryphon Investors, a leading middle-market private equity firm, announced today that it has acquired Rootstock Software, a leading provider of cloud-based enterprise resource planning (ERP) software to manufacturing, distribution, and supply chain organizations…
William A. Levinson
Inflation has skyrocketed during the first half of 2022, which also saw a sharp downturn in the stock market in response to the Federal Reserve’s increase in interest rates to reduce demand. This resulted in a bear stock market and raised the prospect of an economic recession. The nonpartisan…
Martine Haas
One thing is clear about the future of work: Hybrid work arrangements are becoming the norm for many organizations. And no matter the industry, the concerns involve the same five “C” challenges: communication, coordination, connection, creativity, and culture. If you’re struggling to manage a…
(HEIDENHAIN: Schaumburg, Illinois) -- Offering machinists a pioneering way to a new Bluetooth-enabled digital readout, HEIDENHAIN presents the highly anticipated ACU-RITE-brand droPWR. This new droPWR is a first-of-its-kind system to enable an iPad tablet to become a digital readout (DRO), doing…
(Hardy Process Solutions, San Diego, CA) -- Hardy Process Solutions has announced a new line of bench scales that include an integrated display for easy operation. The new HIBSD Washdown Bench Scales offer simplicity and robust performance for light-duty industrial weighing applications. With the…
(Siemens: Chicago) -- With the global drive toward climate-neutral aviation gaining pace and the rebirth of interest in supersonic travel, innovations in aircraft configurations require careful and diligent use of aerodynamic and structural design optimization. Siemens Digital Industries Software…
Yosef Ayzencot
Starting a business is a costly investment. According to U.S. Bureau of Labor statistics, more than half of businesses fail within the first five years of opening. Adding to this pressure were the nationwide staffing challenges during the “Great Resignation” and then the “Great Reshuffle.” This…
