Taming tough machining operations

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END USER: Genesis Attachments, (715) 395-5252, www.genesisattachments.com. CHALLENGE: Increase productivity when machining high-strength steel jaws and other components for recycling and demolition equipment. SOLUTION: Implementing new cutting tools and high-speed machining based on lean manufacturing principles. SOLUTION PROVIDERS: Northwest Wisconsin Manufacturing Outreach Center, (866) 880-2262, www.nwmoc.uwstout.edu; Walter USA LLC, (800) 945-5554, www.walter-tools.com/us

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The products made by Genesis Attachments are literally mechanical beasts, designed to quickly chew up and spit out tons of concrete, steel and other materials derived from recycling and demolition operations.

Components for such equipment can also be a beast to machine. The jaws used on Genesis shears, for example, are produced from Weldox or Hardox proprietary high-strength steels supplied by SSAB, Stockholm, Sweden.

Located in Superior, Wis., Genesis has 130 employees working out of a 55,000-sq.-ft. shop. The company now cranks out a shear every 16 hours using four vertical machining centers, four horizontal machining centers and two turning centers—quite an increase compared with the one shear per month rate when it was established 14 years ago.

Courtesy of Genesis Attachments

Use of Walter Xtra-tec insert drills and high-feed endmills cut holemaking time on high-strength steel shear jaws by two-thirds at Genesis Attachments.

Scott Woerle, machine shop supervisor, credits lean manufacturing efforts during the past 7 years for much of the productivity increase. “We’ve done a lot of work with University of Wisconsin-Stout’s Northwest Wisconsin Manufacturing Outreach Center,” Woerle said. “That includes training in basic lean principles, value-stream mapping, 5S and cellular flow. Last year we ran 20 Kaizen events throughout the shop, and we expect to do 12 to 14 this year.”

Genesis tracks safety, quality, delivery and cost metrics, and results have been impressive. The number of OSHA events has been reduced 50 percent, and quality-related costs have been cut in half. Efforts to reduce machine shop costs have focused on cutting machining time for operations with the longest cycle times.