Arc-On
Aluminum
- Joined
- Sep 6, 2011
- Location
- Holland, MI
Hey Guys,
I am in the process of moving my shop to a new space, and I figured now would be a good time to start a shop thread.
I've lurked on this forum for many years, always reading and learning. I've been encouraged and inspired by a lot of you guys, and I really love the community and knowledge here. Wheelie, Ox, CNC Toolcat, JP, David N, Ewlsey, all of you guys and more have been very educational and helpful in getting me to start my own shop.
Just a little about me. My name is Jake, I've been working in the trades for my whole career in some fashion or another. Most of my career has been in welding and fabrication, but I've done a fair amount of machining along the way.
Industrial Express is my company, a metalworking job shop. I started my business as a side hustle shop about 4 years ago, and went full time in March of 2018. I hired my first full time employee in June of this last year. Things are humming along nicely right now, we have a part time welder as well to keep up with the work.
We do mostly welding and fab work at present, but there is a steady diet of repair work and manual machine work, as well as plenty of strange one off prototype widgets and machine parts. My primary customers are food and beverage producers. Ice cream plants, breweries, bottled water, things like that. We also make parts for product testing equipment, coatings companies, ultralight aircraft, worker safety, and a wide variety of other industries. My only "rule" is I don't work on cars. Heavy equipment and industrial machinery is fine, but I hate working on passenger vehicles. We specialize in aluminum and stainless welding, but we do plenty of plain old MIG on steel.
I recently purchased a used 98 Hurco BMC 4020 VMC to augment the shop's machining capacity, so I feel like it is finally appropriate to have a shop thread on the Practical Machinist, vs just my paltry small manual machining department.
Anyway, here's a few shots of the new digs. I just got keys a few days ago, so we're still moving in. I have most of the smaller machines moved, but I need riggers for a few things. The shear and VMC, mostly. I also have to move the stock rack, pallet racking, office, and a number of other small things.
New shop is about 4000 square feet, give or take a few feet. I have 480V and 208V 3 phase panels. I believe this suite has 200 amps of both, I'd have to check the breakers to be sure. Plenty of power for me anyway. It feels absolutley HUGE, my last shop was half this size, and I could only use about half of it for machines and work space. So this is a massive upgrade.
The shop is kind of a mess right now, nothing is really set in place permanently right now. I have (mostly) everything wired up so we can keep working while we move. I need to keep things somewhat mobile in case the riggers need the room for their forklifts moving the big shear.
I have a 5 ton bridge crane over half the shop, and 2 jibs in the center of one bay, 1 ton each.
Some of the manual machines. I still have to move the drill presses and a lot of tooling. 19" x 80" Leblond Regal, 10" SB Heavy 10, standard issue Bridgeport.
This corner behind the welders will be sheet metal equipment. Right now its just a staging area.
I'll keep updating as I go. I'm sure I'll be leaning on you guys for CNC help as I get moving with that machine.
Thanks for looking.
I am in the process of moving my shop to a new space, and I figured now would be a good time to start a shop thread.
I've lurked on this forum for many years, always reading and learning. I've been encouraged and inspired by a lot of you guys, and I really love the community and knowledge here. Wheelie, Ox, CNC Toolcat, JP, David N, Ewlsey, all of you guys and more have been very educational and helpful in getting me to start my own shop.
Just a little about me. My name is Jake, I've been working in the trades for my whole career in some fashion or another. Most of my career has been in welding and fabrication, but I've done a fair amount of machining along the way.
Industrial Express is my company, a metalworking job shop. I started my business as a side hustle shop about 4 years ago, and went full time in March of 2018. I hired my first full time employee in June of this last year. Things are humming along nicely right now, we have a part time welder as well to keep up with the work.
We do mostly welding and fab work at present, but there is a steady diet of repair work and manual machine work, as well as plenty of strange one off prototype widgets and machine parts. My primary customers are food and beverage producers. Ice cream plants, breweries, bottled water, things like that. We also make parts for product testing equipment, coatings companies, ultralight aircraft, worker safety, and a wide variety of other industries. My only "rule" is I don't work on cars. Heavy equipment and industrial machinery is fine, but I hate working on passenger vehicles. We specialize in aluminum and stainless welding, but we do plenty of plain old MIG on steel.
I recently purchased a used 98 Hurco BMC 4020 VMC to augment the shop's machining capacity, so I feel like it is finally appropriate to have a shop thread on the Practical Machinist, vs just my paltry small manual machining department.
Anyway, here's a few shots of the new digs. I just got keys a few days ago, so we're still moving in. I have most of the smaller machines moved, but I need riggers for a few things. The shear and VMC, mostly. I also have to move the stock rack, pallet racking, office, and a number of other small things.
New shop is about 4000 square feet, give or take a few feet. I have 480V and 208V 3 phase panels. I believe this suite has 200 amps of both, I'd have to check the breakers to be sure. Plenty of power for me anyway. It feels absolutley HUGE, my last shop was half this size, and I could only use about half of it for machines and work space. So this is a massive upgrade.
The shop is kind of a mess right now, nothing is really set in place permanently right now. I have (mostly) everything wired up so we can keep working while we move. I need to keep things somewhat mobile in case the riggers need the room for their forklifts moving the big shear.
I have a 5 ton bridge crane over half the shop, and 2 jibs in the center of one bay, 1 ton each.
Some of the manual machines. I still have to move the drill presses and a lot of tooling. 19" x 80" Leblond Regal, 10" SB Heavy 10, standard issue Bridgeport.
This corner behind the welders will be sheet metal equipment. Right now its just a staging area.
I'll keep updating as I go. I'm sure I'll be leaning on you guys for CNC help as I get moving with that machine.
Thanks for looking.