Industry Reports

Videos • December 2, 2025

The Daily Grind #3 — Leading By Example

On today's episode, I have my first guest! We will be discussing some ways in which engineers and the shop personnel can better work together and repair the communications breakdown between the two that so often plagues the industry. As an added bonus to round out 2025, this episode and the next will both be double-headers, in that I will have the live interview for you here, along with a recorded interview that augments the live show. Please stay tuned directly after our live interview to see the added bonus clip. If you miss the bonus talk, it is uploaded on my LinkedIn Page below:

Videos • November 25, 2025

The Daily Grind #2 — AutoDesk vs. SolidWorks

On today's episode, I will be discussing the age-old debate between AutoDesk and SolidWorks. Featuring investigative results on the opinions of various professionals who use these products.

Videos • August 27, 2025

Honoring Legacy Through the Jerry R. Iverson Memorial Scholarship

In this video, Terry Iverson, founder of Champion NOW!, shares the story behind the Jerry R. Iverson Memorial Scholarship and how it honors his father's legacy in manufacturing. He explains how the scholarship is funded, who it supports, and why it matters for the future of the industry.

Videos • June 27, 2025

Increase CNC Productivity with Lyndex-Nikken’s Precision Presetters

At Lyndex-Nikken, the team demonstrates the E346BA tool presetter—a mid-entry, granite-base tabletop model designed to improve shop efficiency by measuring tools offline and maximizing spindle uptime.

Videos • December 31, 2024

Exploring Hands-On Manufacturing at Camp Champ

Camp Champ offers students hands-on experience in manufacturing. Participants rotate through stations to learn skills like inspection, lathe operation, and CNC machining. They create wooden pens and personalize them at the laser engraving station. The event highlights the importance of practical skills and career paths in manufacturing, encouraging students to consider apprenticeships and engage with local industry processes.

Videos • January 17, 2024

Camp CHAMP! bringing manufacturing to younger generations

CHAMPION Now!, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to change how American manufacturing is perceived in our nation, held its latest Camp CHAMP! event on Nov. 30, 2023, at the College of Lake County Advanced Technology Center in Gurnee, Illinois. CHAMPION NOW! has brought its efforts to the local level by holding training camps for middle school students at various venues in the Chicago area.

Videos • September 29, 2023

ZOLLER support for student-run shop

This 5-minute video report on Eagle Manufacturing, a student-run business at Brown County High School in Nashville, Indiana, is presented as a video supplement to the following Lead Angle column published in the October 2023 issue of Cutting Tool Engineering magazine.

Videos • September 29, 2023

ZOLLER Automation Days 2023

ZOLLER Inc. welcomed manufacturing professionals from a range of industry verticals to its North American headquarters in Ann Arbor, Michigan, for Automation Days on Aug. 9 and 10, 2023. Customers and industry leaders highlighted the unique solutions ZOLLER offers to automate cutting tool management and establish more resilient, reliable processes in the face of a labor shortage that is expected to leave 2.1 million jobs unfilled by 2030.

Videos • December 1, 2022

A Look Ahead to downwind turbines

For six years, in conjunction with collaborators at University of Virginia, University of Texas at Dallas, ColoradoSchool of Mines and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Lucy Pao – the Palmer endowed chair in the department of electrical, computer and energy engineering – and her team have developed the Segmented Ultralight Morphing Rotor, or SUMR, turbine, a two-bladed, downwind rotor to test the performance of this lightweight concept.

Videos • July 23, 2021

Makino, Mastercam, Helical Solutions achieve aggressive material removal rate

CNC Software Inc., Helical Solutions LLC and Makino Inc. — a software developer, cutting tool maker and machine builder, respectively — share the results of their joint R&D project that began with an email introducing a new high-efficiency six-flute endmill with a chipbreaker. This report is a video supplement to the Get With The Program column in the August 2021 issue of Cutting Tool Engineering magazine.

Videos • February 12, 2021

Diabolical ironclad beetle research

A study by engineers at Purdue University and University of California, Irvine, found that the toughness of a diabolical ironclad beetle lies in its two armorlike elytra that meet at a line, or suture, running the length of the abdomen.

Videos • September 18, 2020

Surface Finish on A36 Steel

ProvenCut recipe 586 struck a wonderful balance, machining a piece free of chatter and yielding an extraordinary finish using a YG-1 V7 PlusA six-flute endmill held in a Lyndex-Nikken SK16 collet holder. The 2D contour finishing operation was programmed with Autodesk Fusion 360 and run at 210 m/min. (690 sfm) at 0.015 mm feed per tooth (0.0006" feed per tooth) with a 0.203 mm (0.008") radial DOC and 63.5 mm axial DOC.