Shop Solutions Continued from page 60
deposition (CVD). The lower temperature reduces micro- cracks, leaving a smoother surface with fewer stress raisers. “We’ve worked with high-feed mills in the past, and the performance of this new Ingersoll Hi-Quad-F mill has been surprisingly impressive,” said TEM. “The geometry fulfills the full potential of high-feed machining practice. Moreover the coating enables us to crank up the surface speed beyond what we believed possible.”
In fact, TEM is in the process of converting all their 34 mills over to the new Hi-Quad-F for roughing. We’re doing this also to take advantage of the Ingersoll ‘free cutter’ promotion running throughout 2014,” said TEM.
Based on actual results on the titanium job, TEM expects to save at least $500,000 a year in machining costs when all 34 machines are retooled this way. “More important, it will boost our overall production capacity. We can take on more work without having to buy larger taper equipment, especially more titanium work which puts us in a much more competi- tive bidding environment. Now, shops with 40-taper machines can compete for titanium work.” ME For more information from Ingersoll Cutting Tools, go to
www.ingersoll-imc.com, or phone 815-387-6600.
Job Shop Builds Business with Waterjet
S
tarting a job shop—particularly with no experience—is no easy feat. But with a little help from the right partners, success was within reach for Carlos Fernandes when he found his success with an old friend and a new supplier. His career in high-end remodeling took a twist in 2008 when a longtime friend returned from Eastec with an idea: to start a waterjet shop. “At the show, he saw a Mitsubishi waterjet machine. He was in manufacturing and had used and looked at other wa- terjet machines, but he liked what he saw in Mitsubishi,” Fer- nandes said. “So we called Mitsubishi and went to Rochester, NY, to see the machine. And that’s where it all began.” At the time, Fernandes knew nothing about waterjet machining, but he was impressed with MC Machinery as an organization. He and his friend returned home from their trip with the bill of sale for a new DX3000 waterjet. ACP Waterjet (formally ACP Machine Shop) opened in January 2009, starting from scratch without a single custom- er. The partners hit the ground running—mailing and visiting
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potential customers and creating a website and running Google AdWords campaigns—all while continuing to work their full-time day jobs.
“When we started getting customers, we would go to the shop after work—working from 4 pm to whenever we were done, plus weekends,” Fernandes said. “It was rough. We had to crawl before we could walk with a few customers here and there.”
Waterjet cutting at ACP Waterjet easily handles reflective metals like these 1/8” (3.1-mm) brass gear components and provides extremely tight corners and tolerances.
During these tough times, support was critical and Mit- subishi answered the call—literally. “We would call the private cell phones of our reps, who would answer on weekends. Because that was the main time we were working in the beginning. It was our only option,” said Fernandes. “And they would always answer and solve the problem over the weekend. They made the best efforts toward maximum uptime, and I don’t think I ever had to go more than a day to get parts to get the machine back on track.” By 2010, business had doubled and moonlighting was no longer an option. Fernandes bought out his partner, quit his job, and began working full-time at ACP.
“I had to make it work,” said Fernandes, who had a new- born at the time. “There was no other option, no looking back.” Fortunately, ACP was still growing at a steady clip by 2011—about 50–60% year over year.
“My goal became and still is to try to get the shortest lead times possible—one to three days depending on the job,” Fernandes said. “Quoting is something I am still re- ally crazy about because I want to give customers a quote
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