Steel Case Tour

I think that this was the most interesting tour of the year. I might have been due to the timing with all my course material or the fact that I have never seen most of those operations that close. When we started the tour I was very interested in the transfer presses. We had just completed a study of cams and gears and that fit in great with what I saw. Most rememberable was the cam that drove the scrap shaker under the press. Besides the little things it was incredible to see such a large piece of machinery smoothly and easily punching out pieces.

The laser cutting was also an interesting processes. However, I still do not believe that that operation is faster and less expensive than punching the pieces. The economic balance would not seem to favor the laser on the process I saw, but it may be more beneficial on other parts.

The paint system was interesting only because my uncle had a great deal of the designing and implementation of the process. He designed and directed the installation and modifications of the processes. However, the whole process has been seen a few times before that day.

I could not believe how much work had to be done to cut the rolls of steel into sheets that the presses could use. I also did not understand why they did not automate this process before all of the presses or none of the presses. Plant space and machine time may have to be considered for each press compared to the plant?

Their warehouse was kind of intriguing with the robots doing all of the work. If they are just in time, why do they have so many parts on their shelves? I was always told to design around the herbies. The robots were interesting though. It seems that they could save a lot of man hours and space in a facility with a large amount of stock on the shelves.