Lean Initiative- CAR Rearranges Milling Department

Hello loyal newsletter readers and welcome to the Q2 2013 CAR company newsletter.  Our lead story is that we have moved all our CNC mills into one dedicated area.  Previously, we had our production mills near our QC lab and our special project mills in our tool room.  CNC Project Engineer, Steve Gerrard, believed there were efficiencies to be gained by having like machines and staff all working together.

So far the results have been excellent.  Our senior machinists from special projects have been more present to assist with some of our less experienced and apprentice machinists.  One operator is able to run several machines at a time, due to closer proximity.  It is easier for QC to keep tabs on all the jobs that are running in the mills.  We have left one Haas Mill in the tool room so our tool and die makers have access for their progressive die tools.  Now that the mills are out of the tool room we have more space available for tool making and stamping department material, a win/win.

Newly aligned mill crew ready to machine parts

CAR Adds 2nd Seat of MasterCam with Solid Modeling

CAR Engineering converted to MasterCam software for programming parts to run on our CNC machines back in 2007.  Last year we upgraded our current software and added the solid modeling further enhancing our capabilities versus only being able to view the parts in the traditional 2D format.  Different machine shops have different philosophies on programming parts.  Some shops have one or two dedicated programmers, whose main job is to work on the computer writing programs for the machinists to load and run.

At CAR we believe in having our top machinists program their own parts, run them, and then save the data so a less experienced set up man or operator can run them again when the work repeats.  On day shift we have 3 strong machinists with programming ability plus our NYS mill apprentice is learning too.  We have one programmer on nights.  As you can imagine there is often bottlenecks when several people want to work on MasterCam at once.  We tried some creative scheduling but finally saw the need to add a full second seat of MasterCam with Solid Modeling, which was installed May 1st 2013.  As per company policy CAR always has the latest version of MasterCam and we are currently running X7.

US Baird 820 Multi-Slide Update

Loyal newsletter readers know CAR made a major machine investment earlier this year when we purchased the largest multi-slide in the world, a US Baird 820.  This powerful stamping machine can handle material up to 3/16 thick and 8 inches wide.  The machine was in excellent shape but was purchased used and CAR needed to make some additional investments to get it up to our high standards.

As of publication of this newsletter, the 820 is basically ready to go and make parts.  We have installed a brand new control panel, upgraded the electrical power, and the machine is running under power.  There is a little “fine tuning” left with some of the slides but all very minor items.  Some of our customers have already sent in RFQ’s that would be perfect for our 820.  Please strongly consider this machine, it has all the same benefits of a traditional multi-slide but can handle much bigger parts.

Bouncy, Yvette, and Todd looking forward to running some 820 parts!

Tool Maker Mike Goungo Gets Best Birthday Gift Ever

Those of you on baby watch know that 2 CAR employees were expecting new babies this quarter, Mike Goungo’s wife and Yvette Pagano.  Mike was patiently waiting for his baby daughter to come; his wife was a week late.  Lo and behold she went into labor and at 4:15 am on Feb. 28th, 2013, which just happens to be Mike’s birthday, he welcomed daughter Isabel Michaela Goungo.  The baby was 19 ¾ inches and 6 lbs. both baby and mother (Mike’s wife Jill) are doing great.  Baby Isabel joins big sister Olivia as the newest edition to the Goungo clan.  Congratulations Mike!

Isabel Michaela Goungo

Big sister Olivia holds baby Isabel

Baby Girl Pagano, Still Cooking

Baby girl Pagano was due on May 6th, 2013 and has yet to make an appearance.  Yvette will continue to work until the baby arrives.  Her first baby was 3 days late so she is hoping that any day now the wait will be over.  She will be taking a standard maternity leave, expected back in the office around the 4th of July time period, depending on when baby shows up.  There is a great crew at CAR to back her up, but she will be checking email, etc. from home so please feel free to reach out if she can be of assistance.  Be sure to check out the Q3 newsletter for photos.