Overall, 2016 has been a pretty good year for U.S. manufacturing. In every industry covered by ASSEMBLY magazine, manufacturers were investing in people, plants and equipment.
If you can’t see it, you can’t measure it, and if you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it! This is the simple mantra of successful manufacturers the world over. Manufacturing excellence can only come from manufacturing visibility.
Quick change is a popular type of magic in which performers appear in entirely different costumes within just a few seconds. It’s an act that takes tremendous skill and lots of practice to perfect.
Light is critical for our health and well-being. In the morning, bright light helps us wake up and feel alert and energized. At night, dimmer light cues us to go to sleep. Equally important, the right type of light enables hospitals to provide surgery and other essential medical services 24/7.
Whether a manufacturer is large or small, it’s always interested in saving money—whether it’s a large or small amount. Consider a huge company like Lockheed Martin Space Systems, and its constant need to cut costs in every aspect of a project, such as parts needed to build a satellite.
For more than 30 years, manufacturers have used infrared welding (IW) to assemble plastic components that are large, made of challenging materials or have high strength and hermetic requirements.
Lumps of coal go to Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton for giving us a choice between Scylla and Charybdis. An extra lump goes to The Donald for running a campaign that set new lows in civil political discourse.
Power tools collect a wealth of data about the fastening process. With some simple statistical analysis, engineers can obtain valuable insight into the fastening process.
When the market demands products be made better or faster, manufacturers must respond in kind. For manufacturers in many industries, robots are essential to meeting these ever-changing customer needs.