Five or six years ago, the average consumer might have been hard pressed to find something that said, “Made in the United States” in their home. Outsourcing was the name of the game, and U.S. manufacturing suffered. People lost their jobs and factories shut down. Today, there’s been a resurgence in U.S. manufacturing. Increased funding… Read more »
3D printing has been around for more than three decades, but it’s just now starting to make its way into mainstream manufacturing. Well, it’s been used in manufacturing for years, but not in the way that many people expected it to be used. While 3D printing is commonly used by manufacturers for research and development,… Read more »
What do you know about Industry 4.0? The term is being used more frequently, and while you might have seen it in an article, or heard someone use the phrase, you weren’t quite sure what it meant. The term started with a project by the German government which aimed to blend computerization and manufacturing. Computers… Read more »
Recent reports show that growth in U.S. manufacturing slowed down during the month of January. There was still growth, just not as much as economists had predicted. When results fail to meet expectations, people develop a sense of uncertainty, and with uncertainty comes questions — a whole slew of questions. If things didn’t go the… Read more »
The automation market is growing at a remarkable rate. According to the Motion Control Association, the number of motion-control products that were shipped worldwide grew by 9 percent over the course of the first three quarters in 2014. While that statistic is impressive on its own, it’s even more significant when you put it into… Read more »
Maybe you’ve hired a temporary worker, or maybe you’ve been a temporary worker at some point in your career. Someone quits unexpectedly, or gets sick, or injured, and an employer needs to find a replacement on the spot. What happens when the replacement worker is unskilled? You have to spend time training them to make… Read more »
When it comes to robots, there seems to be two schools of thought. You have those that believe that more automation leads to fewer jobs for humans, and then you have those who believe that more automation leads to more jobs for humans. This is a discussion that has been going on for years. Will… Read more »
Smart Factory isn’t the name of some high profile university, or some hip slang for your brain. Smart Factory is just another name for smarter manufacturing. A smart factory makes use of automation, motion-control, robots, IoT — anything that gives an advantage over old factories. With smarter manufacturing you get higher efficiency, accuracy, productivity, and… Read more »
How would you like a custom robot, a robot that fits your specific needs? Well, look no further than a modular robot. Modular robots can be easily modified through the addition or removal of components. Does your robot need an extra arm? Pop an extra arm on there. Does it need a set of motion… Read more »
What did vibrations ever do for anybody? Earthquakes are vibrations that rattle buildings to the ground and cause bridges to topple over. Vibrations cause massive tsunamis that destroy entire cities with a quivering wall of water. Vibrations can ruin a perfectly good game of Jenga. Wouldn’t it be great if there were some way to… Read more »