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Cesiumsponge is back!

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Chris

Thu Apr 20 2006, 10:19PM

Registered Member #8 Joined: Thu Feb 02 2006, 04:34AM
Location: Harlowton, MT, United States
Posts: 214

Anyhow enough dry and tedious ranting about myself.

Well if that's dry stuff I don't know what isn't! It sounds like some awesome and amazing work you do. I'm sure it gets tedious after awhile like anything, but jeez, it's great stuff, and I was glad to hear you were doing so well now when you emailed Chris R a couple months ago.

I look forward to you posting and participating here again! It's too bad things are so busy for you but such is life I suppose.

Anyway yeah, Rhino is still working as well as ever, no new patches or updates since your departure though. This project I've got going now would be far less organized without it. As for what to do with the end products, I don't suppose it takes a lot of imagination hehe. Sodium, Potassium, Cesium (I wonder how hard it would be to make a sponge out of that), anhydrous Ferric Chloride, and Ferrofluid will all result from it, and I imagine they will be made available to those who might dabble in them responsibly.

And now I must bug you about getting on IRC as you insisted we do! I saw you popped in last night but we missed you. Can't wait to see you there sometime.

Cesiumsponge

Fri Apr 21 2006, 12:54AM

Registered Member #397 Joined: Wed Apr 19 2006, 12:56AM
Location: Western Washington
Posts: 125

Work can be boring and exciting. Sometimes we get mystery parts and I'm the only one that bothers trying to figure out what it is. Sometimes it's something lame like a subassembly part for explosion-proof switches (not as exciting as the name would suggest) and sometimes it's something like a missile defense part. You'll get scrap parts and end up keeping them because they're so crazy looking. It all ends up for the best since I want to start up my own CNC shop at home...machining is almost a must for any DIY hobbyists. I know before I had a lick of experience, I would abuse my drillpress or use facilities on campus and would kill for some machining time for my projects. Now I'm neck-deep in it and I'm not remotely getting sick of it.

We're not a production shop so nothing really gets super tedius...largest part orders are perhaps 2500pcs and most of those are done on our 6+ axis swiss turning centers. Actually there is a video of one in action here. Watch if it you want to see insanity (and a programming nightmare). They're unlike traditional lathes and specifically referred to as "swiss turning" machines:

We have two of six Tsugami swiss turning centers in the state. They're slightly different without the B-axis turret but they still run multiple simultaneous machine programs at once...on a Windows OS of all things. They're probably the coolest and most impressive machines we have and they're generally reserved for production (in the industry) as they're time consuming to set up, but we get some insane parts that can't be done efficiently any other way. I actually don't have much time on lathes and work on several 4-axis VMCs since most of the work we do is turning...that just means job security since only the foreman and myself know how to run VMCs...the boss won't even touch them.

We're getting ISO certified though (finally, free tool calibrations for me) and they've been in the proccess of buying new machines and one of the VMCs is rumored to get replaced so double woot as old stuff gets crappy. This particular VMC is almost 20 years old and it's slow, loud, and monsterous (and sea foam green). It works flawlessly and could bore an engine cylinder from a solid iron block in one pass if it wished to but it's just ancient. It was actually a plain NC (not CNC) machine and took teletype instructions at one point in time (the ribbons with punched holes) and was upgraded later with a serial dataport to take instructions via a networked computer. The thing's onboard computer actually has magnetic film bubble memory!

Anyhow I'm still hyped and its great fun for me. I will try hopping on later today after getting some stuff straightened out. I definitely want to log in some time this weekend but I might be rebuilding an engine on Saturday since I got the day off (unless on Friday, I'm asked to come in), though that isn't for certain. We'll see though. Check out that link...those swiss machines are more impressive than EDM, laser, or waterjet cutting in my opinion.

*woo, found a video link to one of the models we actually have:

Chris

Fri Apr 21 2006, 01:17AM

Registered Member #8 Joined: Thu Feb 02 2006, 04:34AM
Location: Harlowton, MT, United States
Posts: 214

That's awesome. Those machines are insane.

With a name like "swiss turning center," I'm going to assume they are Swiss in origin, heh. You must be one of the very few people in the world who actually get a high paying, rewarding job that they love and never get tired of, and all without going to college for 10 years or something.

I don't think I'd even need hobbies or free time if I could get a job like that, my entertainment and need to build things would be all covered; I can't help but envy you greatly. Hopefully the work remains exciting and you don't tire of it too soon though. I'm sure it's still nice to relax once in awhile.

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