Hello all,
I work in a small low quantity/high mix job shop (9 people on two shifts) which is a department in a large factory(500 people plus). We are technically part of out factory maintenance department (20 plus people), I’m saying this because they get into tooling they shouldn’t be.
Several years ago I took over tooling ordering and inventory. I have spreadsheets I’ve made with part numbers for end mills and such.
Carbide end mills are my biggest issue. We store them in a couple drawers in a lista cabinet with a sticker on the drawer “new mills only”. The idea was get a new mill out and when done put it in your box for the next time until its shot. I don’t like this because then you have mills all over peoples boxes but it has worked ok until recently. Now someone is getting into stuff and putting them back. So I go to order tooling and see four mills in a size so I don’t reorder, only later to find they’re all used.
How do you small shops handle this? I’m considering locking the cabinet and giving those that should be in there a key. Maintenance guys can use a HSS end mill on the rare occasion they come in, they don’t need to be using high performance carbide.
I had thought about putting a small “used” divider in-front of each size to place the used one to be used before new ones.
We have some division in the shop, a few of us are more new part makers (cnc equipment) and some are more repair/maintenance machining so we have different tooling needs.
Any thoughts on ways to do this? I’ve thought about a vending machine or barcode scanner but not sure we’re big enough for that. Thoughts on the “used” divider or just continue putting them in individuals tool boxes? Or a separate unlocked cabinet?
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I work in a small low quantity/high mix job shop (9 people on two shifts) which is a department in a large factory(500 people plus). We are technically part of out factory maintenance department (20 plus people), I’m saying this because they get into tooling they shouldn’t be.
Several years ago I took over tooling ordering and inventory. I have spreadsheets I’ve made with part numbers for end mills and such.
Carbide end mills are my biggest issue. We store them in a couple drawers in a lista cabinet with a sticker on the drawer “new mills only”. The idea was get a new mill out and when done put it in your box for the next time until its shot. I don’t like this because then you have mills all over peoples boxes but it has worked ok until recently. Now someone is getting into stuff and putting them back. So I go to order tooling and see four mills in a size so I don’t reorder, only later to find they’re all used.
How do you small shops handle this? I’m considering locking the cabinet and giving those that should be in there a key. Maintenance guys can use a HSS end mill on the rare occasion they come in, they don’t need to be using high performance carbide.
I had thought about putting a small “used” divider in-front of each size to place the used one to be used before new ones.
We have some division in the shop, a few of us are more new part makers (cnc equipment) and some are more repair/maintenance machining so we have different tooling needs.
Any thoughts on ways to do this? I’ve thought about a vending machine or barcode scanner but not sure we’re big enough for that. Thoughts on the “used” divider or just continue putting them in individuals tool boxes? Or a separate unlocked cabinet?
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk