The Lone Machinists

This week on the Lone Machinist Podcast, Jamie discovers exactly how much aluminium his LK can accommodate, unfortunately only after machining the first enormous plate and discovering that the machine's door frame has other ideas.

What follows is several nights of temperature-controlled machining, ice in the coolant, precision boring, banana-shaped plates, and a particularly unpleasant fly cutter affectionately named Tool 666.

Meanwhile, Curt introduces Jamie to the concept of yak shaving, where attempting to complete one simple task somehow results in rebuilding half your lathe. He also puts his new drilling process through its paces, sacrifices a few drills along the way, and discovers that the lathe might still have the upper hand.

There's also mist extraction and air-quality testing, shaving minutes off cycle times, Jamie finally getting Home Assistant talking to the LK again, and an ongoing battle with label printers that apparently cannot perform the unreasonable task of working with a computer.

Plus, the office ceiling boards still haven't arrived, the workshop is getting smarter, and the list of things that need doing is somehow getting longer.

Sometimes the hardest part of machining isn't making the part. It's completing the seventeen side quests required before you can even start.

Links Discussed:

• Rob Hutchins: https://www.instagram.com/builtbyhutch/

The Lone Machinist:

• Website: https://thelonemachinists.com/
• Bonus Content: https://thelonemachinists.com/#bonus-content
• Merch: https://www.jspeceng.com/online-store
• Patreon: https://patreon.com/TheLoneMachinists

Need Work Done? Check out Subtract Manufacturing at: https://subtractmanufacturing.com/

Jamie:

• http://instagram.com/jspec_engineering
• https://www.jspeceng.com/
• https://www.noughticalwh.com/

Curt:

• https://www.instagram.com/confoundedmachine/
• https://www.confoundedmachine.com/

This week on the Lone Machinist Podcast, Jamie has been listening to The E-Myth again and has come to a rather uncomfortable realization. He's apparently done everything wrong. After a week of running machines, putting out fires, and discovering that Carl isn't a telepath, it's time for SOPs, better workshop organization, and the horrifying prospect of becoming an actual manager.

Meanwhile, Curt has encountered an entirely different problem. He carefully scheduled his production around suppliers being late, except everyone delivered on time. Now his workshop is full of titanium, packaging, and more things to do than his brain knows what to do with.

Jamie also manages to squeeze 20 hours of machining into a 24-hour period, starts developing a steel-bluing process for his gripper inserts, and announces that the Slowio is officially heading for the exit.

There's also mist extraction that's been waiting a year to be installed, enormous Bambu prints, questionable material tolerances, production bottlenecks, and the ongoing realization that buying another printer is almost always the answer.

Everything is arriving, everything is running, and apparently nobody knows where the fucking scale is.

Links Discussed:

• Payton Modarra Monday: https://www.youtube.com/@payton_dean
• Jessie from DataProto: https://www.instagram.com/dataproto?dlrf=bXN2azhjN280M3Fn

The Lone Machinist:

• Website: https://thelonemachinists.com/
• Bonus Content: https://thelonemachinists.com/#bonus-content
• Merch: https://www.jspeceng.com/online-store
• Patreon: https://patreon.com/TheLoneMachinists

Need Work Done? Check out Subtract Manufacturing at: https://subtractmanufacturing.com/

Jamie:

• http://instagram.com/jspec_engineering
• https://www.jspeceng.com/
• https://www.noughticalwh.com/

Curt:

• https://www.instagram.com/confoundedmachine/
• https://www.confoundedmachine.com/

This week on the Lone Machinist Podcast, we're experimenting with workholding, tumbling media, and how to make manufacturing a little less painful.

Curt's been testing different tumbling media on titanium pen bodies, discovering some surprisingly good finishes along the way. Apparently, tumbling is just witchcraft with extra steps. He's also moved pen-body drilling from the lathe to the mill and cut the cycle time from nearly six minutes to under two, with a few ideas for improving coolant delivery still in the works.

Jamie has been working on new workholding inserts, discussing Joshua's new Firmworks vice, and speed-running replacement Anchor Point bodies after discovering a fixture orientation mistake. There's also a look at minimum stock levels, unattended machining, and making production less of a constant emergency.

Elsewhere, we discuss using AI to manage customer orders, thermal printers, software companies making questionable decisions, and a certain giveaway involving a Freddy MicroPlus. Plus, there's experimental 3D printing, more shop projects, and a discussion about why you probably shouldn't give away every last keel clamp you own.

It's another week of making parts, solving problems, and occasionally creating entirely new ones.

Links Discussed:

• Payton Modarra Monday: https://www.youtube.com/@payton_dean

The Lone Machinist:

• Website: https://thelonemachinists.com/
• Bonus Content: https://thelonemachinists.com/#bonus-content
• Merch: https://www.jspeceng.com/online-store
• Patreon: https://patreon.com/TheLoneMachinists

Need Work Done? Check out Subtract Manufacturing at: https://subtractmanufacturing.com/

Jamie:

• http://instagram.com/jspec_engineering
• https://www.jspeceng.com/
• https://www.noughticalwh.com/

Curt:

• https://www.instagram.com/confoundedmachine/
• https://www.confoundedmachine.com/

This week on the Lone Machinist Podcast, Curt discovers that despite operating machines, running a business, and apparently being a functioning adult, he still cannot reliably add numbers together. A simple order count leaves him 100 pens short of reality, and it takes Claude to point out that the problem isn't the AI. It's Curt.

Meanwhile, Jamie discovers that one of his production parts is effectively being made at a fraction of the required hourly rate. The part itself isn't necessarily a disaster because it sits within a profitable family of parts, but it sparks a much bigger discussion about costing, batch quantities, material, consumables, and knowing where your money is actually going.

There's also a serious effort to stop stockouts from screwing up production, with reorder systems, QR codes, minimum quantities, better workflows, and finally getting the workshop organized.

Then we get into 3D printers, and both Jamie and Curt are discovering just how much easier life becomes when a printer actually works. Production fixtures, racks, tooling, functional parts, and 18-hour print jobs are suddenly just things you send to the machine and forget about.

Plus, gantry automation, uptime monitoring, gauge pins, drag tumbling, and a kindergarten field trip involving a very large corn maze.

Math is hard. Good printers are magic.

Links Discussed:

• Tumbling: https://www.instagram.com/p/C4QXPIOOl0z/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&stkn=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

The Lone Machinist:

• Website: https://thelonemachinists.com/
• Bonus Content: https://thelonemachinists.com/#bonus-content
• Merch: https://www.jspeceng.com/online-store
• Patreon: https://patreon.com/TheLoneMachinists

Need Work Done? Check out Subtract Manufacturing at: https://subtractmanufacturing.com/

Jamie:

• http://instagram.com/jspec_engineering
• https://www.jspeceng.com/
• https://www.noughticalwh.com/

Curt:

• https://www.instagram.com/confoundedmachine/
• https://www.confoundedmachine.com/

This week on the Lone Machinist Podcast, we're back from IMTS and apparently nobody came home with fewer projects.

Curt has managed to create a rather serious problem for himself after launching a one-minute presale for his pens. The idea was simple, keep the sales window short so he wouldn't end up with more orders than he could handle. Unfortunately, everyone who got the pens into their carts during that minute could take their sweet time checking out. The result? Curt sold more pens than he's ever sold before and now has hundreds of pens to make. Rookie move.

Jamie has his own growing list of projects, including new products, customer work, a lathe project, more Anchor Point pallets, and plans for a bigger 3D printer because apparently the existing printer has started taking up valuable desk space.

We also spend plenty of time talking about the recent IMTS trip, including Paper Kurt's adventures, meeting patrons and machinists, Chicago, New York, and the truly ridiculous amount of walking involved. Jamie averaged around 16,000 steps a day, and somehow still came home wanting to do it all again.

There's also plenty of CNC automation, pneumatic systems, tooling, printers, production planning, and the usual discussion about buying more equipment because clearly that's the solution.

Hundreds of pens, thousands of steps, and absolutely no spare time.

The Lone Machinist:

• Website: https://thelonemachinists.com/
• Bonus Content: https://thelonemachinists.com/#bonus-content
• Merch: https://www.jspeceng.com/online-store
• Patreon: https://patreon.com/TheLoneMachinists

Need Work Done? Check out Subtract Manufacturing at: https://subtractmanufacturing.com/

Jamie:

• http://instagram.com/jspec_engineering
• https://www.jspeceng.com/
• https://www.noughticalwh.com/

Curt:

• https://www.instagram.com/confoundedmachine/
• https://www.confoundedmachine.com/

Jamie is officially running on fumes as the IMTS marathon continues, but there’s still plenty of time for machines, workholding, questionable engineering ideas, and collecting an absolutely unreasonable amount of free stuff.

Today’s recap covers small five-axis machines, the X-Horse, ToolDawns, a Wazer demo, and why a Wazer might make sense for some applications but definitely isn’t the answer to everything. Jamie also discovers some seriously clever engineering at the Lang booth, including a robot-loading system door that apparently gave an engineer a solid boner.

There’s also discussion about mineral-cast router frames, IGUS samples, pneumatic workholding, EMO, tumbling systems, and the possibility of building a servo-driven tumbler because apparently buying one isn’t enough.

Meanwhile, Jamie has accumulated enough pens, stickers, flash drives, tombstones, Tech Decks, and other booth loot to justify its own inventory system.

The show is winding down, the FOMO is getting worse, and Jamie is already planning what needs to happen at the next one.

Need Work Done? Check out Subtract Manufacturing at: https://subtractmanufacturing.com/

The Lone Machinist:

• Website: https://thelonemachinists.com/
• Merch: https://www.jspeceng.com/online-store
• Patreon: https://patreon.com/TheLoneMachinists

Jamie:

• http://instagram.com/jspec_engineering
• https://www.jspeceng.com/

Curt:

• https://www.instagram.com/confoundedmachine/
• https://www.confoundedmachine.com/

Day two of IMTS, and Jamie is somehow fitting even more machines, people, questionable decisions, and engineering ideas into an already packed schedule.

The day ends with Oktoberfest, late nights, escalator shenanigans, and a trip back to the Airbnb to talk shit until midnight.

And starts straight back into IMTS, with Jamie working his way through tooling, workholding, abrasives, automation, and an increasingly ridiculous collection of machines.

There’s discussion about Index’s wild multi-spindle Swiss setup, Siemens PLCs and integrating a probe, a tiny CNC project for grinding serrations into inserts, and why apparently a pneumatic vise is now something Jamie needs to build. They also discover that the steel shelf was actually aluminium, leading to Tall Jacob being sent in because nobody knows who he is.

Meanwhile, Curt continues experiencing IMTS through messages and social media, while Jamie keeps getting recognized by his voice and discovering that seemingly everyone is at the show.

Add in giant machines, questionable prototypes, FOMO, meetups, karaoke, and a water bottle that is becoming increasingly thick, chunky, and girthy, and Tuesday at IMTS is shaping up nicely.

Need Work Done? Check out Subtract Manufacturing at: https://subtractmanufacturing.com/

The Lone Machinist:

• Website: https://thelonemachinists.com/
• Merch: https://www.jspeceng.com/online-store
• Patreon: https://patreon.com/TheLoneMachinists

Jamie:

• http://instagram.com/jspec_engineering
• https://www.jspeceng.com/

Curt:

• https://www.instagram.com/confoundedmachine/
• https://www.confoundedmachine.com/

IMTS is officially underway, and Jamie has already discovered that three hours in the machine tool hall gets you through roughly one third of it.

In this Monday recap, Jamie and Curt catch up on the first day of the show, the meetup, the endless FOMO, and the sheer number of people, conversations, machines, stickers, and merch flying around. Jamie talks about getting recognized by his voice, finally meeting Grimsmo, collecting enough stickers to make his water bottle significantly girthier, and spending the day wandering through the halls with various machinists and manufacturers.

There’s also plenty of machine-shop nerdiness, including Index’s ridiculous multi-spindle Swiss setup, the LK machine Jamie is eyeing, tiny C250s, high-precision five-axis machines, temperature compensation, giant gantry routers, and a massive hamburger being milled from a ton and a half of material.

Meanwhile, Curt gets to experience IMTS entirely through everyone else’s Instagram stories.

And apparently Jamie is now being peer-pressured into making a pneumatic vise.

Need Work Done? Check out Subtract Manufacturing at: https://subtractmanufacturing.com/

The Lone Machinist:

• Website: https://thelonemachinists.com/
• Merch: https://www.jspeceng.com/online-store
• Patreon: https://patreon.com/TheLoneMachinists

Jamie:

• http://instagram.com/jspec_engineering
• https://www.jspeceng.com/

Curt:

• https://www.instagram.com/confoundedmachine/
• https://www.confoundedmachine.com/

This week on the Lone Machinist Podcast, the machines are starting to outproduce the humans, which sounds great right up until you realize somebody still has to finish all those damn parts.

Curt is running huge production batches ahead of a pre-sale, discovering just how much his machines can actually produce, and realizing that hand finishing is rapidly becoming the bottleneck. We get into pocket clips, blasting, tumbling, sanding, scotch-briting, abrasive brushes, custom tooling, and increasingly questionable ideas for automating the finishing process.

Jamie is getting ready to head to IMTS, trying to prove out programs before leaving, considering whether a Swiss machine might actually make sense, and dealing with a workshop back door that has apparently decided it wants to become a water feature.

There’s also plenty of discussion about Instagram posts versus reels, ultrasonics, production mistakes, traveling to the US, and the increasingly chaotic schedule surrounding IMTS and the following weeks.

The machines are doing their jobs. Now apparently the humans need to catch up.

The Lone Machinist:

• Website: https://thelonemachinists.com/
• Bonus Content: https://thelonemachinists.com/#bonus-content
• Merch: https://www.jspeceng.com/online-store
• Patreon: https://patreon.com/TheLoneMachinists

Need Work Done? Check out Subtract Manufacturing at: https://subtractmanufacturing.com/

Jamie:

• http://instagram.com/jspec_engineering
• https://www.jspeceng.com/
• https://www.noughticalwh.com/

Curt:

• https://www.instagram.com/confoundedmachine/
• https://www.confoundedmachine.com/

This week's episode of the Lone Machinist is basically what happens when the machines start producing faster than the humans can keep up.

Curt is drowning in production, running huge batches of parts ahead of a pre-sale and discovering that the real bottleneck isn't machining anymore — it's finishing. We get into hand-finishing pocket clips, blasting, tumbling, abrasive brushes, custom tooling, and the increasingly ridiculous idea of automating all the bits that happen after the machine stops.

Jamie, meanwhile, is preparing for IMTS, trying to quote a massive recurring machining job, figuring out how to make some questionable drawings less stupid to manufacture, and discovering that his new workshop has a back door that apparently doubles as a water feature.

There's also international shipping, tariffs on stickers, transporting a ridiculous amount of merch to the US, Instagram deciding that photos aren't interesting anymore, and Curt continuing down the ultrasonic-cleaner rabbit hole.

And somewhere in all of this, a bigger printer and possibly a Swiss machine start looking like perfectly reasonable purchases.

Basically: the machines are doing their jobs. Unfortunately, we aren't keeping up.

Links Discussed:

• Comparing Ultrasonic Units Video: https://youtu.be/rdouvT3zZzg?si=86_zWZ3fT2RyzE_l
• IMTS Meet Up RSVP Form: https://forms.gle/CQXMmFsTZEytb8gD7

The Lone Machinist:

• Website: https://thelonemachinists.com/
• Bonus Content: https://thelonemachinists.com/#bonus-content
• Merch: https://www.jspeceng.com/online-store
• Patreon: https://patreon.com/TheLoneMachinists

Need Work Done? Check out Subtract Manufacturing at: https://subtractmanufacturing.com/

Jamie:

• http://instagram.com/jspec_engineering
• https://www.jspeceng.com/
• https://www.noughticalwh.com/

Curt:

• https://www.instagram.com/confoundedmachine/
• https://www.confoundedmachine.com/