Always nice to converse with someone else who's been there...done that!
-It is indeed, perhaps that would explain our similar conclusions.
I might say that the shop I mentioned, which is currently outsourcing their die machining, is my old business. If it's any consolation, the outsourcing is local not offshore.
-Nothing wrong with spreading the work around your local, it's difficult to do every operation in house. You at least sub'ed out the work to your area and helped your neighbor. One of the larger mold shops in the Chicago area was going bankrupt after 3 generations of making transmission die cast molds for the OEM auto makers. I fet bad for him until I heard he was making the rounds at all the other mold shops pimping for the Chinese. I sympathize for a failing business but you don't go cutting the throats of every other mold/die maker in the area just so you can live well. You helped your neighbor and that's what I was talking about in my first post.
They were a great machine and like my buddy say's, "So easy it was as if a tenth was a thick as a side of beef" !
-And now these wonderful machines are sold for scrap iron value.....
Funny you mention form grinding, unlike a lot of shops in the pre-wire days, we form ground all of our die steels & punches.
-I once worked at a stamping house that thought it was acceptable to sharpen a punch by facing it on a lathe, they didn't want to spend the money on grinding wheels. I didn't remain there long and doubt they did either.
You're right that evolution is partly to blame BUT, someone NEEDS to explain to me why our illustrious governments could not have placed a "North American ONLY built tooling" condition on the bail out cash which they threw around like candy??
-If you've spent the last 10 years as a lawmaker investing in the third world it's not surprising to find that trade flows so easily to/from there. It didn't just turn out that way, when you follow the money the answer becomes easier to understand. Someone once remarked that politics is the second oldest profession and closely resembles the first. Are you held accountable for the work you do? Why should a public official be any different? We've all been sold downriver by those that were elected/appointed to sheppard the public.
I spoke recently with the GM of one of the largest die shops in North America.
They're pursuing "super plastic forming processes" in which a super heated blank is die formed and cooled before the press opens. I was told that our industry has approx. 5 years of life remaining unless new processes are developed.
-Interesting new process, we'll develop the technology here in the West and then export the whole process to cheaper labor markets like we've done with everything else that allowed North America to be at the forefront. We send the technology offshore in pursuit of greater profits and are left with nothing. Sort of reminds me of doing the prototype work for cheap, expecting the bigger numbers promised later, only to see the prototype taken elsewhere for the production run. Haven't we seen this before by the same types?
One final thing I'd like to mention, for the poor saps who're reading this(!), re. solids design & cnc'd die builds.
Diemakers who possessed the skills to calculate, manually machine, & build large & complex prog. dies from pencil drawn designs (in a job shop environment) were, in my opinion, the highest skilled & respected tradesmen in any of the trades.
-I'm inclined to agree with the "skilled" half of that statement. I don't think we've ever been respected by anybody except other metal workers. Most people have no idea what we do/did. Ever chase .0001 on a die block all day and go home wanting to tell the wife/girlfreind how you held tolerance? Was she impressed? Did anybody at the bar slap you on the back and buy you a drink? Or did you get the blank stare and a "Gee that's nice"? That's one of the reasons why the other trades saw their wages increase while we struggled to get another .25 cent raise every year. I don't think the average person understands what or even why we chose this as a career. I still make things for others now and then and most of the time they have no appreciation for what it took to create the part. This is made clear when they don't understand why it took so long to make the part (Aren't you done yet?). A brick wall is easily understood (not easily made), a machined part that interacts with other parts isn't understood as well by the general public. If they don't understand the part they certainly won't understand why you want so much money to create it. If you can't impress those close to you what chance did we have of impressing the general public? No I'm going to have to contend that the dirty shoes, smelly clothing, and grit under our fingernails just made us look like slobs in the eyes of the general public and so we didn't deserve any more respect than we got. Even the office people in machine shops didn't regard us very highly did they? The work was dirty, dangerous, and demanded your full attention every moment of your shift. All of you have my respect but I doubt it will come from an "outsider".
-I hope things will turn around but it's not likely they will until the lawmakers can make a killing on the domestic front.
Take care.
-Good talking/typing with you Paul. I wish you good luck, we're all going to need it.
-Maurey  |