Educational Career Training School

Some folks go to machinist school for career training. Other folks go to machinist school because they like to make things. Sometimes women go to machinist school because the trade is male dominated. (Either they want to meet guys or to show folks they can do what the guys do.) Other people go to machinist school because their parents say "Either move out or go to school." (They figure machinist school is an easier or more fun education than accounting.)
At least once, a hispanic political activist went to machinist school in hopes of finding discrimination against hispanics. (Instead he learned a trade!) Others go to machinist school because of a free opportunity - they got a scholarship, they got laid off at work and the unemployment office is sending them to school, they are in some kind of disadvantaged (disabled, minority, etc) status that receives educational benefits, or maybe they are using veterans educational benefits. Another group is the offspring of machinists, going to school to follow the trade of their ancestors. If you want to learn to be a machinist (person that makes things using machine tools) you might go to a machinist school.

Winter??? 30 degrees ........

Degrees can be pretty confusing. A circle can be divided, sort of like a pie, into pieces. If the circle is divided into 360 pieces, the pie is said to be divided into 360 degrees.
Why would this be?
Some folks say it is because of donuts. Donuts are round - they are circular.
Donuts are round circles cooked in hot oil.
The oil is heated to 360 degrees fahrenheit. Thus to keep people from being confused about angular degrees and fahrenheit degrees, donuts have both kinds of degrees equal to each other.
When you stop to think about it, 360 degrees is 30 degrees a month.
That brings up the question, "What is 30 degrees?"
For the answer, you'll need a yardstick (a ruler that is 36 inches looooooonnnnnng).
You will also need a piece of tape or some other nondestructive method to place a mark on the wall.
Step one: from the floor, measure vertically up the wall .... place a piece or tape 18 inches up from the floor.
Step two: lay the yardstick on the floor, perpendicular to (sticking straight out from) the wall.
Step three: the end of the yardsitck against the wall ..... slide it up the wall to the tape/mark
(note: the other end of the yardstick will drag across the floor toward the wall)
Step 4: Announce with glee,"Look everybody, I have invented the 30 degree angle!!!! The yardstick is at a 30 degree angle to the floor. A hotwheels car, driving up the yardstick, would be ascending a 30 degree inclined plane .......... Shazaam, Shazaam, Shazaam!"

The 30 degree angle is a marvelous angle. Now for the test .....
What if you didn't have a yardstick! How far would you have to measure up the wall to make a 30 degree angle if you only had a 12 inch ruler? (ans. 6 inches)
What if you had a 2 foot ruler? (ans. 1 foot)
Can you make a general rule for how far to measure up the wall to create a 30 degree angle?
............. "Half the length of the ruler", you say? Wow! That's right!
What if you took off your belt and found it to be 32 inches long. What if you stretched it from the floor to a point 16 inches up the wall. What if the belt was the same color as automobile tires?
(ans. you'd have a 30 degree blackbelt ..... you'd be a marshall art guy like Matt Dillon)

When people ask, "How do I learn to be a machinist?" ......... tell 'em, "Well, for one thing, you'd better learn how to make a 30 degree angle AND how hot to heat oil to make donuts."

Model Making Involves Machining

Yet another machining activity is making scale models of actual machines.
The "For More Info" Link to Machine Shop Wizard of the World is one such individual.

For Chevy fans, here's one to please:
http://www.moyermade.com/chevyV8.html

Click the picture at the bottom of the link to see the Chevy 327 model engine run.

The Heart of the Machinist School

Here's a link to Grit In the Gears ......
He's got a twisted heart.
See it live ..... (pronounced with a long I or short i?) ....

http://gritinthegears.blogspot.com/2008/11/heart-gears.html

While people say, "To be a machinist, your heart has to be in it," in truth, it is considered good practice to keep organs and body parts out of the machinery.

Machinist School Textbook

To download a great machinist school text about forging and the engine lathe see the following link:

http://books.google.com/books?id=iD5IAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA193&lpg=PA193&dq=lathe+cross+slide+thread+stop&source=web&ots=OBgpj8JkSs&sig=S95bUOsIZ8x3sHWSFRGnPoVcPcQ&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=7&ct=result#PPP1,M1

Machine Tool Operation - Part I - The Lathe Bench Work and Work at the Forge by Henry D. Burghardt is a 1919 text whose copyright has expired and is now available as a free digitized download from Google.

Maybe this IS planet Earth ..... maybe we ARE all in this together .... maybe sharing knowledge IS OK .....

Micrometer - Mike for Short

To learn to be a machinist, one has to learn about the tools of the trade. One of the tools is a micrometer. The micrometer is used to measure distance. The distance is determined in small increments, parts of an inch ..... smaller than half an inch .... smaller than 1/4 of an inch .... smaller than 1/8 of an inch ..... smaller than 1/16 of an inch .......
The micrometer measures in increments of 1/1,000 of an inch (about half the thickness of a human hair).
I showed my little sister a micrometer. "Charlotte, look at the micrometer," I said.
I could tell by the astonishment in her face that she was impressed.
Then she exclaimed,"Nuh-uh ..... no way! That's not YOUR crometer. That's Daddy's crometer!"

Since Cents Make Sense .......

At the Machinist School, we sometimes use scents as air fresheners.
A cent is one-hundredth, in this case, of a dollar - a Penny.
The penny is one percent of a dollar.
The penny can be useful to a machinist. It can be used as a shim.
Sometimes it is used as a screwdriver.
The penny has long been used to settle arguments - "heads I win" .
With a penny in your pocket, you're never broke.

For the machinist, the penny has value as a measurement gage.
The diameter of a penny is three quarters of an inch.
Interestingly, 3 quarters is often written as 75 cents.
Machinists write 3/4 as .750" .... seven hundred fifty thousandths of an inch.
For machinists, one-thousandth of an inch (.001") is the basic unit of measure.
Actually pennies do vary in size due to wear and other factors. The penny in your pocket may vary from .750 by a couple thousandths of an inch .... maybe even more, depending on how hard a life the penny has endured.
You can even add pennies .... 4 pennies equals 3 inches. The penny is a great measuring tool.
Most measuring gages are expensive. You can buy 100 pennies for a dollar!

If you use sharp cutting tools, a can opener maybe, you have a degree of machining skill.
If anyone ever questions your machining ability, take a penny from your pocket and flip it in the air saying, "I'm a machinist and I have my own tools!"

Machinist School - Arkansas Alligator

Are there alligators at the Machinist School in Arkansas? What you see here is an "alligator wrench" .... named for its jaws. This is a on-size-fits-all kind of tool with built-in dies to repair damaged threads. Wrenches of this type were used on farms for quick repairs on tractors, combines, bailers, plows, pumps, windmills, mowers, tillers, carriages & wagons, trucks, cars, and other things that were put together using nuts and bolts.

The Machinist Wedding Chapel

Some folks say that machine shops are dirty, grungy places - mechanistic places, devoid of that which makes for humanity.
Captured here is an example of the frequent machine shop wedding ceremonies. What better place to forge a union? ....... a machinist wedding chapel .........
Machine shops exist to improve society - to make people's lives, better. Machinists earn above average wages - they can afford to have a family!

Metal Spinning

Metal Spinning can be fun and profitable. Sheet metal can be formed, using a lathe, to create the pleasing shapes of rocket nose comes, spittoons, urns, bowls, plates, and cymbals. An example can be seen at this link:

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Vkdr3JKovZQ

One's choice of sheet metal makes a lot of difference in the outcome. A metal spinner at Silver Dollar City said the pewter forms exceptionally well. Because spin-forming tends to harden the metal, many metals require alternating operations of forming and annealing (softening the metal to allow for forming) to achieve the desired results.

Remember the Good Ole Days?

What can I say. Times have changed at NTI, the Machinist School in Springdale, Arkansas. At one time someone said, "A machinist can make anything but money." Today is a kinder and gentler world .... cleaner, moving toward smoke-free ... the machine shop is now a laboratory for surgically removing unwanted material from a substrate. The good thing is that there are fewer machinists. The remaining machinists make big money and are acquiring the title "Surgeons of Steel".

Elbow - Right Angle Drive - Machinist School

Here's a cute item made by our mentor, Marvin Klotz. The quarter provides a frame of reference, indicating size. This "Elbow" demonstrates that there is more than one way to skin a cat. This unique device changes the axis of rotation (horizontal to vertical) without changing the direction (clockwise/counterclockwise) of rotation. Has anyone made this little engine run using compressed air, internal combustion, etc? Check out the video at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZRKNlY7enM

Happy Motoring!

What is CNC?

Sea & Ski is a sun tan lotion.
Sea to shining sea .... that's America the Beautiful.
Scene C, that's like Scene 3, using the alphabet instead of numbers.
At a machinist school or machine shop, CNC means "Computer Numerical Control".
A lot of manufacturing personnel offices are not really aware of what the company does.
You will see employment ads for "C&C" or "C and C" machinists or programmers.
(I have not yet seen an ad for a "C in C" or "C un-C" machinist.)

CNC - Computer Numerical Control - is very much like an Etch-A-Sketch.
A cutting tool is moved along a tool path using left/right and up/down motions.
Instead of calling the directions left/right and up/down .... CNC programmers call the directions "X" and "Y". The cutter moves from one "x" position to another and from one "y" position to another. A given location will have an address (a pair of coordinates ... X,Y).

A computer memorizes all the x and y points, storing the addresses in a file known as a "CNC
Program."

Most people want to know about CNC because they heard you can make a lot of money in the CNC field. For the most part, the ones who make a lot of money in the CNC field .... well .... they are married to the boss's daughter. The boss's son, he makes about the same as everybody else.

Afterall, machinists (for the most part) don't make money. They make doo-dads, widgets, and thing-a-ma-bobs.

Arkansas Machinst School .........NTI.............. The Ability to Get Things Done

College is great. A well-rounded education is great. But sometimes a manager can't find a job. One the other hand, a plumber, a machinist, an electrician, a welder ..... they can always find work at above-average wages.
Imagine calling a plumber to unstop your commode. Do you want the plumber to engage you with lively, well-rounded conversation about Shakespeare and global warming OR would you prefer the individual to focus on the task at hand?
A lot of times, we don't want a well-rounded person. We want a specialist who is willing and able to do the job right now, properly. That's what technical school is all about!
Machinists use lathes, mills, grinders, drills and laser beams to make things - nails, parts for the space shuttle, medical equipment, jewelry, artificial knees - all kinds of things.
If you think paper is for writing on, go be an accountant. If you think paper is for making paper airplanes, maybe machining is for you!

Pythagoras says......

The good old 3 x 4 x 5 triangle is useful for establishing a square corner and for demonstrating the theory of Pythagoras. Is a triangle thinking inside, or outside, the box?

Forging - The Way it is Done in Laos

In Laos, forging is still popular in some areas. In contrast to a fan or bellows, they use a pump-style air blower made of a large bamboo "pipe" with a piston made from chicken feathers. (This one uses a PVC pipe instead of bamboo.) One fellow pumps the air, another does the forging. Some factories have 100 guys pumping air and hammering steel. The anvil is a sledge hammer head, embedded in a stump.

What is IMTS?

Right now, the Machinist School is thinking IMTS.
The big thing going on right now in machining is IMTS:
The International Machine Tool Show is held in Chicago. The event occurs every two years (for the past 100 years). IMTS is September 8 - 13, 2008
Imagine a football field filled with machine tools from around the world ..... that would be about the size of the first floor of the first building.
Check their website for more info.
http://www.imts.com/
If you are into machining, this is the place to be!