Watch Michelle, Derrick & Bob talk about our capabilities on one of our NLX2500 lathes. By running a complete bar with the machine unattended we can work on another machine running a different job at the same time to improve our productivity.
TRANSCRIPTION:
Hi, everybody here at Contour Tool again. I’m trying to share a little bit about some other things we do here. I am Michelle Reland, the second-generation owner at Contour, and I have my friend Bob Scott here, who is our setup guy on our NLX. You’ve met him before, and you’ve also met Derek, Eric Kinder, one of our manufacturing engineers. We had an opportunity with a customer who had some overflow work. Now, do we always have the ability to do overflow work? No, we don’t. But when we have the capacity and it seems like a good fit for us, we will surely take the opportunity. We have some bar stock here, and even though we are known as a small to medium volume shop with most runs here at Contour, we take the opportunity where we can to keep the spindles turning, even in a small lights-out capacity. So Bob’s going to show you, and Derek, a little bit about what we do to turn this stock into these parts. Bob.
Well, it starts with the bar, and we load it into the machine. Through the machining process, we drill, cut it off, and tap it, among other tasks. We can leave it running unattended during lunch and breaks. In fact, we had a meeting today while it was running. That’s how we’re trying to determine how we can make the parts more cost-effective.
When we looked at some of our product lines that we run here, we do handle short orders. However, we have the capability to run a continuous bar naturally. It’s shorter. We’re not equipped with a bar feeder, but the machine itself allows us to process the part and feed it out as if we had a bar feeder, using some tips that we have, and we’re able to keep the job running unattended. Naturally, every job will be different based on its complexity. This part is not too complicated. We have that capability here, not just for short runs.
So, absolutely, as any good machine shop knows, the proof is in the process and the engineering upfront. If these guys have done their jobs right from the beginning, they’ve provided us with a good and smooth process, allowing them to execute efficiently on the floor. We’re thrilled about it—thrilled about the opportunity. Send us a quote, guys. Take the chance.