Manufacturing Output Rose In February

Manufacturing Output Rose In February.

The New York Times /AP (3/18, B3) reports that US manufacturing output rose in February for the sixth straight month in a row, gaining 0.4 percent, according to the Federal Reserve. “Manufacturers have increased production in 17 of the 21 months since the recession ended,” and “stronger factory activity has been an important factor supporting job growth” During February, “factories added 33,000 job.”

Bloomberg News (3/18, Willis) reports that February’s growth “followed a 0.9 percent January gain that was three times as large as initially estimated, Fed figures showed today.” Firms are “benefiting from overseas demand, business investment and inventory restocking that are fueling manufacturing.”

Industry Week (3/18) reports, “The production of durable goods advanced 0.9% in February, and gains were widespread across its major categories.” Motor vehicle production rose 4.2%, and “sizable gains also were recorded in February in wood products; nonmetallic mineral products; computer and electronic products; electrical equipment, appliances, and components; furniture and related products; and miscellaneous manufacturing.”

The “Real Time Economics” blog of the Wall Street Journal (3/17, Lahard) reports that while factories in general are seeing a low level of capacity utilization, textile mills, apparel makers, and producers of computer and peripheral equipment have seen a significant tightening of capacity, although for the first two it’s mostly due to a drop in US productive capacity.

Fed: Philadelphia Area Manufacturing Up.

According to the Philadelphia Inquirer (3/18, Schweizer), the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia reported that, “riding a wave of new orders, manufacturers in the Philadelphia area ramped up production this month to the highest level in more than 27 years,” rising to 43.4 from 35.9 last month. “The strength was broad-based, the Philadelphia Fed said, with manufacturers’ shipments of finished products, unfilled orders, and labor conditions all at high levels.”

Bloomberg News (3/18, Willis) reports, “Rising exports to emerging economies such as China, along business investment and inventory rebuilding are generating bigger gains in factory production.” Industry Week (3/18) reports, “Increases in input prices continue to be widespread, and more firms have been reporting increases in prices for their manufactured goods in recent months. Most firms also indicated that they expect acceleration in production over the next quarter.”

According to the Philadelphia Business Journal (3/18, Kostelni), the indicators “pointed to an uptick in future production activity during the next quarter.”

As Copper Prices Rise, Manufacturers Switch To Aluminum.

The Wall Street Journal (3/18, Whittaker) reports that increasing copper prices have manufacturers turning to aluminum, as the difference in cost of the metals has reached the point that it is greater than the expense of retooling some manufacturing processes as well as the cost of the extra aluminum needed to conduct the same amount of electricity in copper. Wiring for cars and buildings, as well as evaporator and condensing coils for air conditioners and refrigeration are poised to make the switch.

From SME Daily Executive Briefing 3/18/2011

CMF CSS Swing Beam Shear

STANDARD EQUIPMENT

Maximum Line Voltage 220/440, 3PH/60HZ

  • Cut length by timer
  • Blade gap by Hand-wheel
  • ATOS Hydraulic solenoid valves
  • Shadow light
  • 38” squaring arm
  • Cutting counter
  • Single, inching, and continuous stroke
  • Mar-free hold-down pads
  • Ball transfers on the table
  • Full protection guard system

CONSTRUCTION

  1. Strong mono-block construction for minimum deflection.
  2. Hydraulic power unit is easily accessed under the bed of shear where noise level is reduced
  3. Swing beam construction

MAIN COMPONENTS

Ball bearing lead screw: Taiwanese HIWIN
Servo motor and drive: Japanese YASKWA
Straight line guide: Taiwanese HIWIN
Hydraulic system: German HOERBIGER
Seal ring: German FELETZ/Japanese VALQUA

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS (click link below)

CMF CSS Swing Beam Shear Specifications

CMF CS Hydraulic Guillotine Shear Line

CMF CS Hydraulic Guillotine Shear

CMF CS2530 10' x 1" Hydraulic Guillotine Shear

FEATURES

  • All steel welded structure, vibration treatment for removal of internal stress.
  • Integrated hydraulic transmission system for reliability
  • Triple support rolling guide to eliminate gaps of support and enhance shearing quality
  • Power back gauge with manual fine tuning and digital or LCD readouts
  • Gap between shear blades adjusted by hand wheel which is quick and accurate
  • Rectangular blades with four cutting edges to prolong working life with adjustable shearing angle to reduce deformation of cut piece
  • Upper blade holder has inward tilting structure to facilitate material feed in and also enhance accuracy of work piece
  • Shadow light for miter cuts and other off square cutting
  • Options Pneumatic Sheet Support
  • Optional 6’, 8’, 10’ and 12’ Squaring Arms available
  • CNC Controls available

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS (click link below)

CMF CS Hydraulic Guillotine Shear Specifications

CMF CBCN Electro-Hydraulic Synchro NC Press Brake

CMF CBCN Electro-hydraulic Synchro NC Pressbrake

FEATURES

  • Electro-hydraulic proportional servo synchronization free point control within stoke range, repeatability of .001” and.008” parallelism.
  • Bed is fitted with deflection compensation cylinders (above fig.) or upper punch fitted with deflection system. 250 ton and up is fitted with both systems.
  • Fitted with Delem of Holland or Cyblec Co. exclusive computer system.
  • Very strong anti-deviation capability.
  • The ram (Y1 Y2), back gauge (X, R, Z) and master pressure controlled by computer.
  • Ball lead screw rolling guide rail are adopted to back gauge top to get high precision repeatability.
  • Optional digital controlled mechanical robot or flexible machining center for sheets with 7 axis and up

Multi-machine tandem pressbrakes

  • Single machine performance with two machine tandem.
  • When in tandem mode electric-hydraulic servo systems are adopted to provide sensitivity and reliability and high anti-deflection capability.
  • Optional single brake operation.

CMF CB Line of Press Brakes

CMF CB 100/3200 Press Brake

CMF CB 100/3200 Press Brake

FEATURES

  • All steel welded structure using vibrating treatment for removal of internal stress, with good rigidity and stability.
  • Torsion shaft controlled synchronization of mechanical limit stops.
  • Integrated hydraulic transmission system, large range of speed of the ram with stable and reliable performance.
  • Back gauge and ram have electrical adjustment for stoke with manual fine-tuning and digital readout.
  • For bending machines 250 tons and up, synchronization mechanism of mechanical or electrical hydraulic transmission is fitted to the bed with a deflection compensation system.
  • Tandem systems are available.

NC SYSTEM

NC System

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS (click link below)

CMF CB Press Brake Specifications

CMF Ironworker Series

  • MIW Double Cylinder Machine

    Dual hydraulic cylinders for two man operation.

  • Adjustable cylinder stroke with scale.
  • 5 work stations.
  • Large two piece gauging table for punch station.
  • Quick Change coupling nut and sleeve for rapid replacement of punch.
  • Section shear for cutting angles at either at 90 degrees or 45 degrees.
  • Bar shear for cutting round and square bar.
  • 2 movable foot pedals.
  • Electrically interlocked safety guard for notching station.
  • Magnetic light.

SIW Single Cylinder Machine

Hydraulic Holddown

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS (click link below)

Ironworker Specifications

FPP CNC Punch Press

FPP Punch PressStrong mono block rigid C type body built up by stress relieved welded steel construction has high acceleration axes and designed to allow sheet loading from 3 sides ergonomically and the operation to be watched easily. Sheet processing can be done multi-directional and flexible until 0.2″ thickness. Hydraulic, electronic, electric and mechanic components that are respected with its high quality worldwide have been used on the machine.

CNC CONTROLLER

  • GE Fanuc series 18i-PB controller has 10.4″ color LCD screen, 512 KB part program memory
  • All related punch functions
  • Program transfer availability with PCMCIA and ETHERNET
  • Worldwide Fanuc Service advantage

SHEET HOLDERS

  • Automatic repositioning to process sheets as long as 79″
  • Two pieces of sheet holder clamp opens with spring tension and tightens with pneumatic
  • Sheet is pinched without causing any deformation
  • Sheet referencing bar and CAD/CAM controlled pneumatic trap to drop the cut part to the wheeled part box

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS (click below for specifications)

RPP FPP and CPP CNC Punch Press – Rotative Punch Specifications

Fixing the oil industry, one beer at a time

The importance of the pipeline in industry, agriculture and nearly every vital facet of civilization cannot be under-emphasized. Without pipeline construction, we would lack plumbing and electricity, not to mention access to gas & petroleum reserves. But perhaps the pinnacle of modern civilized uses for pipelines can be found in a German town by the name of Gelsenkirchen. The pride and joy of this fair city is a football (European for soccer) stadium known as the Veltins Arena, the self-described “cult temple” of the German football league team FC Schalke 04.

The Veltins Arena is considered to be the finest football stadium in Europe, in a town where football is publicly acknowledged to be nearly on a par with religion. In spite of the fact that its construction is an ultra-modern miracle of architecture, the Veltins Arena is most well-known for its pipeline. Why? Because, unlike most pipelines, this one transports beer.

A massive undertaking of over 5 km in length, the Veltins Arena beer pipeline was constructed to ensure that its fan base would never “run dry”. All 100 bars and restaurants in the Veltins Arena are connected by this beer pipeline to a central tank, which ensures that large differences between between demands during various stages of a match are more easily overcome. This feature of the arena is so important that the German brewery which supplies the beer also obtained the stadium’s naming rights. The brewery’s name? You guessed it: Veltins.

At the end of a football match in the stadium, two key statistics pop up on the arena’s scoreboard: the number of people in attendance, followed by the number of liters of beer consumed. This so impressed a Russian politician by the name of Alexander Vakhmistrov that he decided the city of St. Petersburg absolutely HAD to have a beer pipeline in their stadium as well. The only hitch in his plan was the law in Russia that forbids the sale of alcoholic beverages at sporting events.

I am bringing this up because beer pipelines might be the answer to a serious problem facing the oil industry right now. Reports of major oil pipeline gluts are rampant. There are more pipelines than there is oil to fill them, and many are operating well below capacity. Add to that of course the general public’s love-hate relationship with the oil industry, the recent oil rig disaster in the Gulf, and you have a financial and PR situation of considerable magnitude.

So here’s my foolproof, 3-day PR strategy and financial recovery plan for the oil industry: start using your untapped oil pipelines for the transport of beer into households, immediately. This would not only make people love you but you’d finally have a revolutionary new income-producing opportunity in keeping with the times that would allow you, and your stockholders, to make a full financial recovery. After all, it’s getting to a point where no one can afford gas anymore anyways, which may soon lead to a total change in lifestyle, characterized mainly by people staying at home more. And what at-home activity isn’t made just a little more pleasant when it’s accompanied by a few glasses of beer? I can’t think of a better way to re-instill consumer confidence in the oil industry, literally overnight.

There have been a few recent examples of beer or wine “flowing like water” directly into private residences. In 2006, a Norwegian woman turned on her faucet, only to find that instead of water, beer was flowing out of it. This turned out to be the fault of the bar on the lower floor of her apartment building, which had literally gotten the plumbing lines of their beer delivery system crossed.

Then, in October 2008, residents of Marino, Italy were only too tickled to find out that they had apparently turned water into wine – on the same day as their annual Grape Festival, no less. 10 to 12 households found that when they turned on their faucets, wine poured out – if only for 3 minutes or so. Although they initially assumed it to be a gift from the City Council, it turned out this was due to a mistake in plumbing once again. Apparently, every year during the Grape Festival, the water supplies to the main fountains in the town center are turned off and wine is channeled into them instead. Only in this case, the wine was mistakenly channeled into a few private nearby homes.

Both of the above were clearly mistakes, but look how happy it made people.

I can imagine a day in the not-too-distant future, where I go to my local BP station and purchase several gallons of – beer. Think about it: I can buy a pint of beer for as much as what gas stations charge for a gallon – and buying a pint of beer makes me a lot happier than buying a gallon of gas. It also makes good economic sense for the oil giants to simply replace gasoline with beer. Not only would they be able to charge for a pint what they’re currently charging for a gallon, but they would finally win back the hearts of the people. “Fill ‘er up” might take on a completely different meaning one day.

If any of you pipeline manufacturers decide to take me up on this idea, all I ask is that you furnish my personal residence with a tap.

-Anja Wulf

Introducing ERMAKSAN

As of March 1, 2011 we became an authorized ERMAKSAN dealer on their full line of press brakes, shears, laser cutting and plasma burning machines, iron workers and corner notchers in California and Arizona. ERMAKSAN has been manufacturing metal working machinery since 1965; they make annually approximately 3000 machines in their fully modernized and equipped 861000 ft2 factory. ERMAKSAN is today the largest sheet metal working machinery factory under one roof in Europe.

Especially, we are excited to introduce the EVOLUTION Hybrid Press Brake that is environmentally friendly with its minimum 60% average energy savings compared to conventional press brakes. It is also the most silent press brake in the market (63dB).