Assembly articles from May 2001

Assembly archives from May 2001

Is Quality Getting the Back Seat?
May 1, 2001... I bought a new car in March, a red 2001 Ford Escape with a six-cylinder engine and four-wheel drive. I know--you're happy for me! I mention it not to brag, but to raise a warning flag to the U.S. automotive industry. I purchased the...

Employers Plan to Add Fewer Workers.
May 1, 2001... MILWAUKEE--A long-awaited decline in hiring activity among employers throughout the nation appears ahead for the second quarter. According to a poll conducted by Manpower Inc., 28 percent of employers expect to hire new workers in the...

Loctite Earns Quality Award From Nissan.
May 1, 2001... SMYRNA, TN--Nissan Motor Manufacturing Corp. USA has given Loctite Corp. (Rocky Hill, CT) its Quality Master Award for the fourth consecutive year. Loctite supplies Nissan with adhesives and sealants. Loctite has received more quality...

North American Robot Suppliers Almost Set Sales Record.
May 1, 2001... ANN ARBOR, MI--The North American robotics industry posted its second best year ever in 2000. According to the Robotics Industries Association (RIA), North American robotics suppliers booked orders for 12,744 units in the United States,...

New Process Improves Fuel Cell Assembly.
May 1, 2001... WARMINSTER, PA--Researchers at Hull/finmac Inc. have developed a new method of manufacturing plates for fuel cells. Originally developed by NASA for the space program, fuel cell technology is under commercial development as a method of...

Deere Names Cloos Robotic a Top Supplier.
May 1, 2001... MOLINE, IL--Deere & Co. has named Cloos Robotic Welding (Schaumburg, IL) as a partner-level supplier. The tractor maker's highest supplier rating, the partner-level rating is given annually to suppliers that meet Deere's highest...

Adept Signs Integrator in China.
May 1, 2001... SAN JOSE, CA--Adept Technology Inc. has signed Siasun Robot & Automation Co. (Shenyang, China) to be its new system integrator in China. A subsidiary of the Shenyang Institute of Automation, Siasun was established last July as China's...

Manipulators Replace Robots on French Assembly Lines.
May 1, 2001... PARIS--Believing that people adapt better than robots, a growing number of French manufacturers are using operator-assisted manipulators to move objects around on assembly lines. French carmakers have invested in operator-assisted material...

Site Provides Marketplace for Fixture Manufacturers.
May 1, 2001... KANSAS CITY, KS--Electronics manufacturers looking for test fixtures can reach a host of suppliers through a new Web site at www.fixtureforum.com. The site was started in January by Interconnect Devices Inc. (IDI), a manufacturer of test...

GM to Fund Materials Lab.
May 1, 2001... PROVIDENCE, RI--To find ways to trim vehicle weight, improve recyclability and streamline assembly, General Motors Corp. will fund a $3 million laboratory for materials research at Brown University. "We are eager to work with Brown...

Fiber Optics Expo Added to ATExpo.
May 1, 2001... NORWALK, CT--Manufacturers of optoelectronic products will be able to find the assembly equipment they need at the new Fiber Optics Automation Expo, which will be co-located with Assembly Technology Expo this fall. "The Fiber Optics...

Laser Sales Increase.
May 1, 2001... MCLEAN, VA--North American industrial laser manufacturers posted worldwide sales of more than $721.6 million during 2000, an increase of nearly 30 percent from 1999 sales. According to the Laser Systems Product Group of the Association for...

Asymtek Expands Headquarters.
May 1, 2001... CARLSBAD, CA--Dispensing equipment manufacturer Asymtek has expanded its headquarters facility by 30 percent. With the new space, Asymtek has tripled the size of its manufacturing area, from 88,000 square feet to 120,000 square feet. The...

Panasonic Offers Robotics Training.
May 1, 2001... FRANKLIN PARK, IL--Panasonic Factory Automation Co. offers a program to train engineers how to operate and maintain robotic arc welding equipment. The four-day class is held throughout the year and can be tailored to individual needs....

Staubli Ships 1,000th Robot for Clean Rooms.
May 1, 2001... ZURICH, SWITZERLAND--Staubli AG produced its 1,000th RX clean room robot in November 2000. Manufactured at the company's plant in Faverges, France, the RX robot has a subclass 1 cleanliness rating. The robot can move in six degrees of...

Online Courses Teach Surface Mount Process.
May 1, 2001... FOXBOROUGH, MA-Cookson Performance Solutions has introduced a comprehensive curriculum of 29 online courses to train operators involved in printed circuit board assembly. The courses are grouped in three levels of increasing detail. The...

Sandia Opens Irradiation Test Lab.
May 1, 2001... ALBURQUERQUE, NM--Sandia National Laboratories has opened a new laboratory to test the ability of assemblies to withstand damaging radiation. Sandia's Gamma Irradiation Facility (GIF) can test objects as small as microchips or as large as...

Machine Tool Sales Decrease.
May 1, 2001... McCLEAN, VA--U.S. machine tool sales in January totaled $246.15 million. That's a decrease of 17 percent compared with December sales and a decrease of 22.4 percent compared with January 2000 sales. According to the Association for...

Manufacturers Hesitate to Adopt E-Commerce.
May 1, 2001... WASHINGTON--Despite intense hype, electronic commerce is barely being used by most small-and medium-sized manufacturing operations. According to a survey by Ernst & Young and the National Association of Manufacturers, less than 1 percent of...

Thomas Register Starts CAD Drawing Database Online.
May 1, 2001... NEW YORK--Thomas Register has launched an online database of CAD drawings. Located at www.CADRegister.com, the database contains millions of CAD drawings of components and machines, including actuators, bearings, bushings, conveyors,...

"Ideal" Job Candidates Know How to Communicate.
May 1, 2001... BETHLEHEM, PA--The "ideal" job candidate knows how to communicate, interact and work with others effectively, according to a survey by the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE). Employers were asked to rate the importance of...

Borries Moves to New Facility.
May 1, 2001... ANN ARBOR, MI--Borries Marking Systems has moved to a new, larger facility. The new building will provide the marking machine manufacturer with additional space for a demonstration area, parts inventory, equipment staging and offices.

ITW Acquires Four Welding Businesses.
May 1, 2001... GLENVIEW, IL--Illinois Tool Works Inc. Welding Products has acquired four welding component businesses from DovaTech Ltd. The businesses are Bernard (Beecher, IL), PlazCraft (Beecher), WeldCraft (Burbank, CA) and K&K Welding (Lake Zurich,...

Chrysler Academy Wins Education Honor.
May 1, 2001... WATERFORD, MI--The Walter P. Chrysler Manufacturing Technology Academy has been selected as a winner of the 2001 Governor's Excellence in Practice Award. The award is given annually to an educational institution that "exemplifies the...

Stanley-Proto Starts Tool Safety Program.
May 1, 2001... COVINGTON, GA--Hand tools are safer than ever thanks to new ergonomic designs, higher quality materials and precision manufacturing and testing. Even so, tools are only as safe as the person using them. Recognizing this, Stanley-Proto...

Resin Transfer Molding Technology Helps Jet Take Flight.
May 1, 2001... Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. (Fort Worth, TX) has used an advanced resin transfer molding (RTM) process to fabricate a unitized component for an advanced fighter aircraft. The unitized component resembles the vertical tail of the Joint...

MAKING SENSE OF ROBOTS.
May 1, 2001... Automated vision and touch are more and more common in industrial robots. Assembly lines may soon be equipped with machines that can also hear, smell and taste. It's a cool, crisp early-October in 2020. Jordan Roswell steps out of his...

THAT'S HOW WE'VE ALWAYS DONE IT!
May 1, 2001... Workstation suppliers can offer many ergonomic alternatives to sawhorses and wooden chairs with cardboard cushions. Old doors used as tables. Five-gallon buckets and milk crates for chairs. Containers of parts placed behind operators...

POSITIONING FOR FIBER OPTICS ASSEMBLY.
May 1, 2001... Rapid growth in the photonics market is fueling demand for high-speed nanopositioning devices capable of submicron tolerances. Some things should never be tried. Like eating a taffy apple and talking on a cell phone while driving a car. Or...

COOL, STYLISH AND GREEN.
May 1, 2001... A new cooling display cabinet for delicatessens and supermarkets satisfies traditional customer expectations for product appearance and performance, and meets stringent targets for environmental friendliness. AB ELECTROLUX (STOCKholm,...

Tester Boosts Production.
May 1, 2001... ITW (Harwood Heights, IL) manufactures I/O protection modules. The modules are 2-to-1 multiplexers with 32 inputs, 16 outputs. The modules have transient voltage suppressors on the inputs and outputs. The suppressors on the inputs handle both...

Shaver Automation Shaves Time.
May 1, 2001... Braun GmbH, headquartered in Kronberg, Germany, manufactures small electrical appliances. Virtually all of the company's products are manufactured in its own plants, which produce more than 150,000 units a day. The entire product range includes...

Bumping the Competition.
May 1, 2001... When Meridian Automotive Systems (Angola, IN) needed to boost productivity on a roll-forming bumper operation, the company switched from resistance welding to a weld process developed with Newcor Bay City (Bay City, MI). Business is...

Robotic Adhesive Dispenser Increases Lavatory Life.
May 1, 2001... Crane Plumbing LLC (Evanston, IL) manufactures sanitary housewares. Its Dallas division, which was started in 1985 and has approximately 250 employees, manufactures porcelain-on-steel bath products, such as sinks, lavatories and bathtubs. ...

Low-VOC Fluid Cleans Conformal Coating Equipment.
May 1, 2001... The Motorola facility in Elma, NY, produces over 1 million parts annually, supplying electronic modules to some of the largest automotive manufacturers in the world. Depending on the type of unit installed, its circuits could control one or...

Manufacturer Moves From Manual Welding to Automated.
May 1, 2001... Skill Tool & Die (Cleveland, OH) set a goal of producing a spare tire bracket more efficiently and with better quality. Achieving this goal required streamlining the job from manual welding to a fully automated welding operation. According to...

Software Speeds Up Process Documentation.
May 1, 2001... Analogic Corp. (Peabody, MA) manufactures advanced systems and subsystems for medical, industrial and telecommunications original equipment manufacturers. Like many manufacturing companies, the company needs to translate new product...

Conveyor Is Flexible.
May 1, 2001... The TSplus flexible assembly conveyor accommodates pallet sizes from 160 by 160 millimeters to 800 by 1,040 millimeters, in 80-millimeter increments. The conveyor can be equipped with belt, flat-top chain or roller chain, and it carries...

Weld Nuts.
May 1, 2001... Weld nuts are used for metalworking, appliance leveling and other applications. Made in round- and slab-base styles, the nuts are available in thread sizes of 4-40 to 1/2-13. Bosses can be placed on either side of the base for use in projection...

Machine Applies EMI Gaskets.
May 1, 2001... The Crescendo installs electromagnetic interference gaskets, protective acoustic covers and thermal interface components used in cell phones and other handheld electronic devices. The machine installs up to 12 gaskets per minute. Die-cut parts...

Automated Assembly Cell.
May 1, 2001... The TurboCell is a plug-and-play automated assembly module. It consists of a conveyor, two Cartesian robots and a range of interchangeable tooling and accessories, including screwdrivers and feeder bowls. A central base structure serves as the...

Device Installs O-rings.
May 1, 2001... The "Guts-in-a-Door" installs O-rings and seals in a horizontal direction. The inner workings of the machine are easily accessed for maintenance and clearing faults.

Potting Compounds.
May 1, 2001... Syon Tru-Cast 110M/298 is a clear epoxy that cures at room temperature without discoloration. This clarity makes it suitable for fiber optics, specimen castings and modules requiring visibility of embedded parts. Mix viscosity is 750 eps. It...

Urethane Adhesive.
May 1, 2001... Pliogrip 9100/9115 is a two-component urethane-based adhesive that bonds thermoset composites, thermoplastics and coated metals. It resists humidity and exhibits a long bondable open time.

Deoxidizing Solution for Metal Contacts.
May 1, 2001... Deoxinator deoxidizing solution cleans, preserves, lubricates and improves conductivity on metal connectors and contacts. The liquid dissolves oxides and sulfides that form on metal contact surfaces. It works on stationary and moving contacts...

Electronic Device Cleaner.
May 1, 2001... The Aqualet, Aquastorm and H500 series automatically clean and dry precision electronics and other advanced technologies. Other capabilities include closed-loop water recovery and zero effluent discharge, proprietary pump and nozzle technology,...

Solvent for Cleaning Epoxies.
May 1, 2001... Dynasolve 2000 Plus can dissolve cured epoxy from integrated circuits, power transitors, diodes and hybrid circuits. The dissolving action can not break fragile interconnections or swell encapsulates prior to dissolving them.

Flat Post Standoff for Cable Management.
May 1, 2001... This flat post standoff secures wire bundles above or away from adjacent surfaces. It can be used in enclosures where depth may not be available. Standard EIA mounting hole spacing and cable tie slot design allows application versatility. It is...

Corrugated Tubing Bends Without Restriction.
May 1, 2001... NewAge corrugated tubing protects contents from abrasion, puncturing, ultraviolet and weather. The lightweight and flexible tubing comes in several materials, sizes and colors.

Continuous Flex Conduit System.
May 1, 2001... Adaptaflex consists of nonmetallic conduits in various diameter sizes--from 1/4 inch to 4 inches. This conduit system also consists of nylon conduits, tie downs, and nylon, one-piece Adaptolok press-on locking fittings for assembly.

Stereo Zoom Microscope.
May 1, 2001... SSZ Stereo Zoom microscope is maneuverable and allows for 0.67 to 4.5 objective range. A larger objective range provides a total magnification of 2X to 225X. Standard 10X wide field eyepieces allow for a 34-millimeter field view, which can be...

High-Resolution Mounted PCB Inspection Machine.
May 1, 2001... The IPK V2 mounted PCB inspection machine utilizes four-direction laser beam reflection to perform recognition and inspection of post reflow or post wave PCBs. It can inspect 0603 chips and narrow-pitch components, such as 0.3-millimeter pitch...

Automated Optical Inspection System.
May 1, 2001... The Vi-3200 offers 100 percent PCB inspection up to 600 by 600 millimeters with a throughput up to 150,000 components per hour. It can verify and inspect component positioning, polarity, text, presence and absence, solder paste and joints, and...

X-Ray Inspection System.
May 1, 2001... The RTX Series of real-time X-ray inspection systems are now equipped with dual-VU. Dual-VU provides simultaneous real-time X-ray and vision inspection, with corresponding images displayed on two monitors. During ball grid array inspection, it...

Solder Joint Inspection System.
May 1, 2001... The IS-1000 inspects solder joints and solder balls underneath a component. It can also identify lifted leads, cracks, bridging, cold soldering and misalignment. Images are captured on video and displayed on a 14-inch monitor. Magnification is...

Leak Detection Unit.
May 1, 2001... The Heliot 300 Series is a line of high-sensitivity, portable helium leak detectors. The units are fully automatic in all operating modes. They are suitable for production and research development applications. They can test for leaks...

Mass Flow Leak Detector.
May 1, 2001... Model Q622 has 32 stored test programs. Illuminated switches show pass, reset and maximum flow, and reset and minimum flow. Individual tests or programmed sequences can be performed, and the instrument has a continuous test mode, which permits...

Crimp Pull Tester.
May 1, 2001... This crimp pull tester consists of Model TSB test stand, series BG digital force gauge and fixtures for wire terminal testing. It measures 4 by 8.5 by 19 inches and weighs 18 pounds. The rack-and-pinion mechanism allows for 8 1/2 inches of...

Tensile Tester.
May 1, 2001... The ESL Test II digital tensile tester is voice-actuated for hands-free operation. It performs tensile, compression and peel tests. The operator can control the tester, place data marks during a test, and save and plot test results by speaking...

Bluetooth Test Set.
May 1, 2001... The E1852A is a communications test set for "Bluetooth" wireless networking devices. It performs radio frequency measurement and link verification. It has a frequency hopping source and receiver with known performance, so results can correlate...

Welding Platens.
May 1, 2001... These welding platens are made of cast iron and are suitable for layout, setup, bending, straightening, clamping and workholding. They have integral cast-in cross ribs on the underside for extra strength.

Ultrasonic Assembly System.
May 1, 2001... The 2000f lets users digitally program actual weld force and downspeed, and step force during weld and hold cycles. Traditional and multiple modes are also available. It includes a user interface with a four-line vacuum fluorescent display for...

Terminal Applicator.
May 1, 2001... The UTA 3000 welder features modular subassemblies, and continuous strip terminals can be fed left to right or right to left. An electronic height sensor automatically measures preweld compaction and final weld height. Both crimp and weld...

Downdraft Tables.
May 1, 2001... DFT Series downdraft tables offer a versatile and pollutant-free work surface for welding, cutting and grinding. Optional side and rear spark shields isolate other operations. The units feature an adjustable channel work surface, self-cleaning...

Precision Component Welding.
May 1, 2001... Precision welding equipment can enhance assembly and production of small components with critical tolerances. It reduces scrap rates for surgical instruments, tube end enclosures and guide wires.

Hydraulic Lift Cylinders.
May 1, 2001... Super Dyna-Lift features two- and four-cylinder configurations with lifting capacities of 1,500 to 20,000 pounds. They are suitable for raising and lowering industrial workbenches, welding fixtures and specialty machines. Standard stroke length...

Ergonomic Instructional Workstation.
May 1, 2001... The workstation allows trainers and trainees to see each other and provides an ergonomic work environment. Desks are 30 or 34 inches deep with either a 12- or 16-inch desktop surface. The workstation also adapts to single or dual monitors....

Slope Top for Modular Cabinets.
May 1, 2001... The slope top modular cabinet offers a writing surface with a clip to hold documents in place. It is self-bracing and lockable and can hold file separators and a lamp. It can support up to 100 pounds. The handle has a rotating system.

Protective Eyewear.
May 1, 2001... Cobra protective eyewear weighs 1.1 ounces and features a one-piece lens with dual viewing areas, which offers wraparound protection and an unobstructed view. The lens filters more than 99.9 percent of UVA and UVB rays and meets ANSI Z87.1...

Hose Reel Line.
May 1, 2001... Value Plus Reels hose reels feature steel construction and a containerized mainspring. Hose reels come equipped with an adjustable guide arm, ratchet lock, four roller guide and tension adjustment. They also include brass and stainless steel...

Lined Leather Gloves.
May 1, 2001... Weldrite welding gloves, Y1903, protect during welding and heat applications. They have a reinforced wing thumb and flame retardant hand sock lining. Kevlar thread protects the seams, against sparks.

Acquisitions--Avoiding the Quagmire.
May 1, 2001... No one, especially a shareholder, is happy with a company that doesn't grow. The three most common and obvious ways companies achieve growth are by increasing market share, introducing new products and buying another company. The first two are...