"Harold and Susan Vordos" wrote in
:

a
"Robert Swinney" wrote in message
...
There DE! You heard it from the horse's, errrr, welll mouth.G
Thanx Harold. The great unwashed and inexperienced set can learn
much from old heads like you. I am happy to hear you never used a
DRO and still did tool-grade work. That statement presages a vast
amount of honesty and no small amount of pride, I'm sure. We should
all have your experience but 'taint no way, no how, not in this
lifetime! So, Harold, now that we are
on
the soapbox, give us your take on those that purport to jump right
into
CNC
with absolutely no manual experience. I suspect they are mostly
computer programmers (or less) that believe all they peck out on a
keyboard can be easily done in the physical world.

Bob Swinney

With all due respect for the skills and talent these folks have, most
of which I envy like you'll never know, they wouldn't last a day in an
old method machine shop, assuming they could get in to begin with.

I disagree. A skilled CNC machinist has every skill and then some that
are required to machine parts on manual equipment. That being said I'll
be the first to admit that there are a lot of semi-skilled CNC
"machinists" out there. They know how to change tools, set offsets, use
an indicator, etc. They are skilled operators really. They can set up a
CNC machine and operate it, but they don't have the experience required
to process a part. I've seen these guys try to use manual machines and
frankly they scare me.

On the other hand there are the CNC machinists who develop the process,
figure out the work holding, select the tools and write the programs.
They could work in any "old method" shop and survive just fine. If
anything they might bring a little fresh insight with them. They are also
used to having to think about every single detail before they start
cutting a chip, a discipline that many manual machinists lack. Writing a
CNC program forces you to think about every single step on a micro level
ahead of time. If it ain't in the program the machine won't do it. CNC
machines in general move a whole lot faster, have more power, and run at
higher speeds. This forces you to consider work holding a lot more
carefully than you would have to otherwise.

I started in the trade on manual machines at a time when only the biggest
companies had CNC. Eventually I learned CNC and wound up working as an
application engineer teaching CNC programming to people who had never
used one before. The statements I made above are very broad and general.
Certainly CNC allows you to process a part differently than you would on
manual machines. For example if you are machining a part out of a block
of steel, on manual machines you might blue up the block, scribe lines,
and rough it out on a band saw. On a CNC you would hog it out right on
the machine. So a CNC guy might have to learn a few methods, but I'm sure
they would be fine. Having taught CNC, often manual machinists have to
learn trig and other new skills.


The ongoing struggle those of us have that have worked in the trade,
especially the "old way" (sans CNC) is with people that can't
differentiate between making chips and making parts. I've witnessed
a tremendous amount of that since I began following machining forums a
few years ago. You could likely teach a monkey to turn on a machine
and start making chips----well proven by the fact that I can do it.
The problems start when you have to leave behind the item you're
striving to extract from the metal you're carving-----and only the
item----to specs.

At first glance, machining doesn't appear to be much of a challenge.
Like welding, folks get the idea that because they've burned some rod
(made some chips) that they understand the process, and the difference
between them and a guy that does it full time is they enjoy it, and
the guy that does it full time doesn't (he's likely half right).
Such people, in my opinion, are *new*, or very uninitiated. It
takes skill and experience to make parts, repetitively, to print, in a
timely fashion. There is no substitute for the skill (CNC
excepted)-----it does not come from a book, it does not come from your
best buddy-----damned few are born with it. It comes from the school
of hard knocks, with long, hard hours of getting your hands dirty, and
with proper guidance, so you use good procedures that insure a minimum
risk of scrap and injury.

Very true, but I take exception that you can't learn from a book.
Studying from books while getting hands on experience will shorten your
learning curve more than floundering around and trying to figure out
things by trial and error. Taking night classes at a local technical
college is another great way to speed up the learning process. Often
night classes are taught by folks moonlighting from their day job in a
local factory.

If nothing else I know enough to know that I don't know everything.
Reading helps me stay current. Everyone should subscribe to trade mags,
scour libraries, and go to machine tool shows. You can learn a lot just
by reading tooling catalogs. I've attended classes at Kennametal and
Sandvik. It's time well spent. A good machinist should always be looking
to learn.


Nothing serves as a come to Jesus session better than handing an
unskilled person a print, material, no op. sheet, and point them to a
machine, and ask them to produce a given number of parts that will
pass inspection. Sorts them out right now! Like welding, you can't
fake it. You can do it-----------or you can't. Those that know
the difference can see through you with no effort. It's like playing
a piano. Almost no one does that without paying dues.

Well said.


I don't suggest the CNC guys don't have the proper knowledge to do
their magic on a CNC-----and probably better than most of us can on a
manual machine------but one skill set has little to do with the
other----unless-------the operator has been in both places. Our very
own michael is one such----as are others. These guys are the best of
all worlds, for they can do it by either method. To the man,
though, I have a dime that says that once they've done it with CNC,
they don't really want to revert to the manual machines again. Not if
they're trying to make a living. The work is simply too difficult.

I'll go out on a limb and state that a guy with nothing but CNC
experience is unlikely to be any better on a manual machine than I am
on a CNC---------and that speaks volumes about their inability, at
least in my mind.


Again, it depends on the skill level of the CNC machinist. CNC has
changed the work environment in the shop. In larger companies, often it's
hard for a machinist to develop skills beyond set up and operation. The
highly skilled guy takes care of feeding multiple machines programs and
processes.

CNC machines output a lot more work with fewer employees. This fact often
convinces people that manufacturing is dead in the U.S. Not so. We are
still the worlds largest manufacturer, but that work is done with far
fewer employees than in the past. The operators spend more time feeding
the machines and material handling than in the past. Often they just
don't get the opportunity to advance beyond that point.

Most of the really good skilled people come out of small places that do
short runs, prototypes, model and tool making. As there is more
opportunity in that type of environment to learn. Job classifications are
less defined and often as an employee you are thrown in water that is way
over your head.

From what I see there are far too few highly skilled people out there and
there is a lack of formal training programs to teach those skills.


--

Dan