Don’t Discount the Small Stuff
At least in the short term, the most significant machine design changes aren’t always the most significant difference-makers on the shop floor.
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Charlie Mauer (left), co-owner of Wire Specialists, looks on as fellow co-owner John Mueller adjusts a fixture in the shop’s new MV2400R EDM.
When I first set out to write about Wire Specialists, a contract manufacturer in Brookfield, Wisconsin that specializes in wire EDM operations, I figured the shop’s newest piece of equipment would be a major focus of the article. I was right about that, but the piece still took a somewhat unexpected turn.
Delivered just a few months before my visit, the new addition is a representative of Mitsubishi EDM’s MV series, a line of wire machines with a type of motion system that, to date hasn’t been used on any other machine tool. Having attended the unveiling of the new line earlier that year, I naturally assumed this much-touted innovation was a key factor in the shop’s decision to order a second MV2400R within months of installing the first.
To my surprise, however, the shop’s co-owners had a lot more to say about other design improvements that, from a purely engineering standpoint, might be considered more incremental: a redesigned wire threader; power supply enhancements that reduce wire consumption; new canned cycles in the CNC; and a power feed contact designed for easy indexing. Go here to learn more.
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