wrustle
Titanium
- Joined
- Jun 8, 2006
- Location
- Massachusetts
My home shop started back in 1996. It wasn't planned or even something I had ever dreamed of.....it just sorta happened one day. I've basically been a machinist my whole life but it didn't start out that way. After high school I did a few odd jobs, you know, worked with a landscaping crew, that sucked! Got a job as a dishwasher in a restaurant, which eventually got me promoted to the prep area making salads and desserts. Yahoo, the big bucks were coming in now! I believe I was making $3.75/hr! Liked doing the salads. For one thing it was cleaner than dishwashing, and let's not forget all the HOT waitresses requiring my services! Ok, ok, they were mostly old grandma's and married women with kids, but there were a few young hotties there as well. Anyways....eventually worked my way into the backroom doing food prep and onto the fry-o-laters, and finally the ovens. Was a cook for about a year, best time of my young life, but after partying hardy with everyone for all that time I was still as broke as when I started so I decided to try manufacturing! Yes.....run a machine.....work long hours......get paid minimum wage.....sounded GREAT! Found a job working third shift in a plastics plant running an injection molding machine......you know.....open the door, take out the part, shut the door, push the button, trim off the flashing, repeat....repeat....repeat....repeat.....You've got to be F$%&ing kidding me!.....This sucks even more than being a cook! Changed to a different plastic molding company which made mostly medical supplies......WOW.....place was insanely clean, and you could run the machine while sitting down??......When can I start??!! Worked there for a couple months, and then the "Floorboy" quit his job......so climbing the corporate ladder I took over that position which entailed filling the machine hopper with the plastic pellets and ensuring the machine operators had an ample supply of boxes made up to fill with parts....and run the machine while the operator was on break or lunch......Oh yes.....the easy life was mine for the taking! Some time went by and being a "Floorboy" was awesome, but as fate would have it one of the guys in the toolroom quit and I was offered a job in the toolroom....thus my career as a machininst had begun. Ah....well sorta...my primary function in the toolroom was to disassemble the molds after they completed their runs and clean them...Oh JOY!.....after cleaning and checking for any damage, scratches, yada...yada...greasing and reassembling, I got to drive the forktruck (man I felt like the king) and put them back into the storage rack. Well one day things were very slow and I pretty much had nothing to do, so one of the mold makers took me under his wing and started teaching me how to do some basic stuff on the lathe and the milling machine. Really liked it....A LOT....so I started working with Slim (the mold maker) almost everyday learning how to make stuff....ejector pins, mold clamps, stripper rings....it was great! One day while reading the classified ads during lunch I saw an ad for Cincinnatti Milacron, Heald Division looking for machine operators....."No Experience Necessary"..... that was me! Went down filled out an application and waited.....a week......another week, ......a month.....then....a phone call...Hell Yes, I'll be there Monday morning! Showed up Monday morning lugging my Kennedy Tool Box.....filled with my 0-1" B&S Mic. my 6" scale and an imported 0-6" dial vernier and I was ready to be a machinist. Way Cool....! Went through a six month training program, and learned how to run everything.....engine lathe, knee mill, surface grinder, rotary grinder, and cylindrical grinder. There were about ten of us in the class and after the six months was over we all ended up in different departments in the shop based on our skills in the class. I ended up in the Screw Machine Dept. running W&S turret lathes......LOVED IT!! Worked second shift.....nice shift premium, a bunch of rowdy young guys......let's not forget the incentive pay if you felt like busting your ass working......and who didn't? It was awesome! Anyways years and years went by working there until the late eighties when some serious layoffs decimated the place.....I mean it seemed like a hundred people a week were getting let go......every Friday afternoon it started......the phone ringing all over the shop in every department and you'd see one of your buddies walking somberly down the aisle with his foreman beside him heading to the office.....we all knew it was the end of the line for that guy. This went on it seemed forever. When I started working there back in 1980 there were around 1500 guys working there and when I finally left in 1988 it was down to around 300. I was pretty safe with my job. I had been working in the Jig Bore Dept. for about 5 years and we were considered top notch guys, not only as machinists, but also with regard to pay scale so we could always go out and work anywhere in the shop, but none of the guys out in the shop could come in and do our jobs or run our machines. Thank god for that because some departments had literally one guy left in each....no second shift either. Well, I felt I had better get the hell outta Dodge before I was told to go......much rather do things on my terms rather than theirs, so I quit and got another job for about a year doing the same work.....running a Sip vertical boring mill. The owner of that company passed away and the rumors were rampant they were going to close the place, so off I went again.....this time I ended up at Husky Injection Molding Systems, running a Devlieg horizontal boring mill working nights. Awesome company.....awesome job.....hospital like atmosphere in there for a machine shop......anyways.....did my time on nights, finally got to the day shift running a Sip vertical boring mill and life was so so sweet!! Was making a ton of money, of course working insane overtime hours, time and half on saturday, 12 hour shift, double time on sunday, 12 hour shift. Life was GOOD!! No social life, but damn, laughing all the way to the bank! And the profit sharing was ridiculous!! Believe it or not though it got old quick, real quick! After about 6 years of doing all that I wanted to get off a machine, it was to say the least monotonous! Day after day, the same old thing, put the plate on the machine, bore the holes, take it off, repeat. I wanted to get into programming. Went to night school and took a 15 week course in Autocad.....company paid for it....so why not. Anyways completed the course and after a few weeks got a job working second shift in the programming department. Now it wasn't Autocad, but it was Unigraphics and WOW.....incredibly easy to learn after learning the basics in Autocad. Programmed for six months on nights and got moved to the day shift were I was multi tasking as a process planner and scheduler when the plate line project manager quit. After a few weeks, I got promoted and moved into his office. Now I was HAPPY.....my own office.....great salary...LIFE WAS GOOD once again. About a year and half now has gone by and I'm still smiling ear to ear every damn day....until that fateful Monday afternoon. The phone rings.....it's the presidents secretary informing me there will be a meeting at 1:00pm in the conference room. Cool....just another day, just another meeting.....WRONG....As I enter the conference room I see it's pretty crowded in there.....and I remember thinking to myself....why are all the guys in here from the shop, in fact it's everyone from the plate line. Sure enough in walks the president with his secretary in tow who starts handing out these big personalized manilla envelopes to each of us, all the while Al (the pres) explains that the plate line is moving back to Canada and we are all terminated as of today......have a nice day.....have a nice life....hasta la vista baby! We all ended up with a months severance plus all our vacation time so I now had seven weeks to find another job......but MAN was I depressed.....big time! I felt as though I had the world by the b.....well you know what I mean......and now here I was having to start all over again from the bottom. I sat around the house moping for about a month.....and not too mention angry.....I hated the thought of having to start all over again. I had been through this three times now with three different companies. Never again. My wife (back then) and I talked it over. I took out all my profit sharing and we paid off all our bills except the mortgage. I then started shopping for a machine. After talking with a few other guys who had gone this route they advised me that I should get a knee mill, a lathe, and a surface grinder to start with. That way I could take on virtually any job I could get my hands on. So that's what I did. I started with $10,000.00 cash and bought a Lagun FT2 knee mill,
a Clausing 12" x 36" Toolroom lathe
and a Brown & Sharpe 6" x 18" surface grinder all from Boston Machinery.
It was quite an adventure getting everything into the basement.
I have a 5 Hp rotary phase converter I use to power everything.
Well.....I have a bunch of pictures to add to this, but it's getting late now. I will post more later showing the rest of the manual machines portion of my shop. Then I'll get to the addition we put on (have start to finish pictures) and all the pictures of the Cnc equipment we filled the addition with after it was completed. I think I've rambled on long enough here for one evening, so enjoy, and I'll be back soon.
Best Regards,
Russ
a Clausing 12" x 36" Toolroom lathe
and a Brown & Sharpe 6" x 18" surface grinder all from Boston Machinery.
It was quite an adventure getting everything into the basement.
I have a 5 Hp rotary phase converter I use to power everything.
Well.....I have a bunch of pictures to add to this, but it's getting late now. I will post more later showing the rest of the manual machines portion of my shop. Then I'll get to the addition we put on (have start to finish pictures) and all the pictures of the Cnc equipment we filled the addition with after it was completed. I think I've rambled on long enough here for one evening, so enjoy, and I'll be back soon.
Best Regards,
Russ