John has been with ASSEMBLY magazine since February 1997. John was formerly with a national medical news magazine, and has written for Pathology Today and the Green Bay Press-Gazette. John holds a B.A. in journalism from Northwestern University, Medill School of Journalism.
The distinction between AC induction motors and permanent-magnet DC servomotors was once fairly clear. AC motors were for high-horsepower applications, such as compressors, pumps, blowers and bulk-handling conveyors. DC servomotors were for applications requiring low horsepower, high torque, high cycling and precise positioning, such as machine tools and pick-and-place machines.
Remember 1992? Four Los Angeles police officers were acquitted of beating Rodney King, sparking riots citywide. Compact discs surpassed cassette tapes as the preferred medium for recorded music...
Assembly machines are dumb. They can only do what they’re told, over and over again. Without a sense of sight or touch, they can’t know if parts or pallets are where they’re supposed to be.
The late novelist John Le Carré once said, “A desk is a dangerous place from which to view the world.” As it turns out, what was good advice for spies is equally good for manufacturing and design engineers.
Automotive assembly most often conjures up images of welding robots and electric nutrunners. But, another technology is just as important for assembling a wide range of automotive components—presses.
These days, manufacturers of all stripes are taking a closer at their energy consumption as a potential source of cost savings—even manufacturers of the largest, most expensive products in the world.