The old school machinist who ran the same part for 30 years and never touched a computer

I remember when I first started running mills back in 2004, there was this guy Bill at the shop in Dayton. He could set up a Bridgeport blindfolded, but he refused to touch the new CNC controls. He told me 'these screens lie to you, son.' He kept doing everything by hand, even drawing out his own tool paths on graph paper. Fast forward to 2016, the shop made him retire early because they couldn't justify his output against any kid who could push a button. I saw him at a flea market a few years ago and he still had that graph paper notebook. It got me thinking about how much of what we learn today is just troubleshooting software instead of understanding the metal. Does anyone else feel like the older guys who fought through the manual years had a deeper feel for feeds and speeds than most of us will ever get?

3 comments

3 Comments

fionafoster3d agoTop Commenter

Did I miss the part where graph paper gets you a raise, or was that just Bill's secret?

phoenix_martin402d ago

Bill's graph paper was for his DnD dungeon maps, trust me.

paul_ramirez2d ago

That graph paper notebook was probably worth more than the whole CNC training manual. I watched a guy like Bill hand grind a cutter to match a worn print tolerance that took me three days to figure out in the CAM software, and he did it in one afternoon with a cup of coffee. You're right that the kids can push buttons, but when the spindle sounds wrong or the part starts squealing, they don't know what the metal is telling them. Bill might have been slow on output, but he never scrapped a $2,000 block of 4140 because the software said the speeds were fine. Is that really something we can afford to lose?