Customer supplied material, changed material... Didn't know / didn't tell me.

How do you guys handle this situation?

I ran a job with a bunch of chrome plated rod. He said it was plain mild steel, not heat treated when I bid the job.
The first order went about as smooth as it could have and the material was not even close to hard.
I used HSS drill and tap on one end of the part and one of each completed the 30 parts.

Yesterday he dropped of more of the "same" material and I set up the job using the same tools, same program.

A few parts in I lost a HSS drill. No big deal, there's a drawer full of those drills.
Two more parts and then the worst drilling sounds coming from my part, so I stop the program... Drill is smoked.
I check feedrate, speed, coolant, facing insert, etc... All looks good.

Now I'm buying a carbide drill to finish the job...

Next I go over to the trash and pull out a piece of the sleeve the chrome bar came in. His material is 1045 at 50RC.
I'm a little torqued, but my customer probably didn't even know the vendor gave him something else.

This guy is a good guy / great repeat customer. I'm not angry at him just a little frustrated that I wasted a bunch of time this morning.
I'm just a little curious what you guys do given that situation.

My response is to call him and let him know I have to wait until after the holiday to get the drill and will have to bill it to him.
I'll eat the HSS drills and the time "we" wasted.

You managed somehow to tap the holes that you drilled in the hard stuff? I can't imagine 'doing a few' and not noticing.

Chalk it up to learning and move forward. Either source the material yourself or be perfectly clear with your customer (who sounds ignorant to the process) what it means to source the wrong stuff.

OR get more professional and require certs. use software for purchasing, sourcing, billing, blowing, birthing, Machining, shipping, and Toilet cleaning.

R

HuFlungDung said:

You managed somehow to tap the holes that you drilled in the hard stuff? I can't imagine 'doing a few' and not noticing.

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Sorry that was unclear the way I explained it in my post above.
The other end is a second op and it gets a drill and the tap.
I have not run those yet on this second, harder batch. I will change to a carbide tap(that drill and tap will have to be billed to him too).


The first op (this morning) I am facing, drilling, boring and single pointing a thread.
All those tools are carbide except the HSS drill.

Also, I think this batch of material is a mixed bag of what he had on hand plus the harder stuff he just bought from his vendor.
The first few parts ran fine and then I hit the tough stuff.

We have a policy against using customer supplied material - too many issues; they don't know the difference between hot rolled and cold drawn, they don't know the difference between grades of steel or aluminum or stainless steel etc. They get it cut too long, too short, too thick. Just too many issues.

And it is usually because they are trying to save against marked up material. It just doesn't work. I just turned a job down because the customer was trying to insist on using material (commonly available) that they supplied. No thanks. Been there - done that. Too many issues.

cwtoyota said:

How do you guys handle this situation?

<snip>

My response is to call him and let him know I have to wait until after the holiday to get the drill and will have to bill it to him.
I'll eat the HSS drills and the time "we" wasted.

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I would do the same, and have. 304 substituted for 303, 800 x .093" dia holes 1.150" deep- what fun.

Good customer- bill the cutters and eat the time. This time around.

It probably slipped past him, give him the benefit of the doubt. He will be more careful about material next batch. If not, then charge the new price or tell him you need to provide material.

Good customers- we can cut them a little slack now and then. When we need a break they are less likely to make a fuss. It comes back around...

In my book your problem hasn't even happened yet. Post back on how tapping those 50RC holes with that 1 carbide tap goes. I have a hunch you should also get a thread cutting end mill. I'm not being a smart ass here I truly am interested in how the tapping goes. I gotta tap already hardened TS at around 46RC all the time, I've never tried a carbide tap.

Brent

If you would have ordered the material, you would have checked when it arrived to confirm it was what you ordered, right? When the customer orders, same thing... you've got to check the material in. You quoted the job based on a certain material, and this is different, so the price needs to be different. Your quote DID specify the material, right? I'm with jancollc... good customer, bill the tooling and chalk the time up to a learning experience.

Dennis

I would definitely ask the customer to talk to the supplier and ask for a material exchange.

1045 chrome plated is typically supplied for hydraulic cylinders. It's available in CPO (chrome plated only) and IHCP (induction hardened chrome plated). IHCP comes in at Rc50, sounds like that's what cwtoyota is dealing with.

The case thickness of IHCP is about .050", so it might be okay once you get into the core.

Heavy chamfer on that thread, lol.


*** data from Pacific Machinery and Tool Steel book, ymmv. ***

guest said:

I would definitely ask the customer to talk to the supplier and ask for a material exchange.

1045 chrome plated is typically supplied for hydraulic cylinders. It's available in CPO (chrome plated only) and IHCP (induction hardened chrome plated). IHCP comes in at Rc50, sounds like that's what cwtoyota is dealing with.

The case thickness of IHCP is about .050", so it might be okay once you get into the core.

Heavy chamfer on that thread, lol.


*** data from Pacific Machinery and Tool Steel book, ymmv. ***

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After reading that I called the manufacturer with the part number. Sales guy knew what it was right away.
It's not the hard stuff and I made a wrong assumption from their website, the label and my drill carnage.

I went to the local place and picked up a couple of better quality drills to try.
I'm back up and running.


I'm always willing to admit my mistakes and this one is all mine.
So it's still an interesting conversation despite the fact that I wasted a couple hours. I do appreciate the input and thoughts and I suppose I'm in the chalk it up to a learning experience frame of mind.

Yardbird, I was thinking the same... I have never personally tried a carbide tap in hard material either but a shop I worked at in the past used them.

I'd open dialogue with the customer. Maybe he doesn't realize what he sent you. Maybe wrong material was shipped at the material supplier.

cwtoyota said:

...I'm always willing to admit my mistakes and this one is all mine.

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I'll take losing a couple hours over beating my brains out drilling and tapping 50 rockwell any day.

Sitting on the windowsill in front of my desk, there is a hunk of steel with a 1/2-13 form tap welded in the hole. I keep it there as a reminder for me to check the coolant in the lathe before I walk away.

The tap, I didn't care. The part, I didn't care. But damn, it cost $700 to rebuild the tapping head from that one...

cwtoyota said:

After reading that I called the manufacturer with the part number. Sales guy knew what it was right away.
It's not the hard stuff and I made a wrong assumption from their website, the label and my drill carnage.

I went to the local place and picked up a couple of better quality drills to try.
I'm back up and running.


I'm always willing to admit my mistakes and this one is all mine.
So it's still an interesting conversation despite the fact that I wasted a couple hours. I do appreciate the input and thoughts and I suppose I'm in the chalk it up to a learning experience frame of mind.

Yardbird, I was thinking the same... I have never personally tried a carbide tap in hard material either but a shop I worked at in the past used them.

View attachment 213544

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So it wasn't an IHCP-like material?
Was it just harder than you expected, and the speeds/feeds were too much for the tools?

ManualEd said:

So it wasn't an IHCP-like material?
Was it just harder than you expected, and the speeds/feeds were too much for the tools?

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That's exactly it, and I got away with it the first run of parts.

cwtoyota said:

That's exactly it, and I got away with it the first run of parts.

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Still sounds like hardness variability from what's supposed to be identical materials. This is where having a decent hardness tester and doing spot checks can give you a heads-up when having issues with stock.