Skilled Machinists Needed!

"Back in 1918, the situation was dire. There were not enough skilled machinists to keep munitions plants running full tilt."

History repeats itself. In the late 1930's "Lend Lease" required a crash training program to teach all kinds of machinists and machine operators. The produced much of the newly invented/designed equipment to defeat the 'Axis.'

Please click on and read the following, you will find that "Lend Lease" began in March 1941, before the US was pushed by Japan into WWII. Not in the late 1930's, sorry!

Lend-Lease

It may seem like a small point, but when others read this blog, they may go away with the wrong impression......its up to us to be accurate!!!

Have a great day in spite of me!!

Right you are. I seem to recall some training program was already in progress and weren't we selling machine products etc to GB which latter became lend lease.

Autocad has taken the tedium out of the hands of skilled draftsmen and requires skilled technicians.

CNC has changed the machine shop to take the tedium out of intricate and costly parts by automating the entire process. And in effect the programmer is another specialist.

The new machinists are hobbyists who learn on their own small lathes and or multi-function bench top machines. They build models of almost anything for the sheer satisfaction of being able to say the did it themselves.

Jan Rdidder of Holland, <http://heetgasmodelbouw.ridders.nu> design and builds some exquisite Steam ICE and Stirling engines.

I must disagree with the 'skilled technician' statement, being a former draftsman and illustrator of the old school, I have found that most cad operators are just that they operate a computer with no real knowledge of what they are drawing. back when, dam but I sound old, you became intimately knowledgeable of the machine part/assembly you were drawing. The engineering staff frequently asked our opinion on improvements, because of our experience with the designs. Ask the skilled operator for their opinion and all you get back is a puzzled look at best. I am not saying CAD is not a boon to manufacturing, just the skill and imagination of the draftsman has been taken out of the trade, 3D Cad will solve many problems before they become true bottle necks unfortunately most of the operators never recognize this, they just continue clicking on the mouse and banging on the keyboard.

Sorry for the rant, back to my drafting table and pen...

I wonder what trades or professions were considered unessential in 1918 and what would be such today. Maybe Politicians and Lawyers for a start.

Is the US drastically understaffed today?

Yes, as I go to various vendors during my rounds, one of the first questions asked by Large and Small Shops, Union and Non-Union is "Do you know any Welders, Fitters, and/or Machinists?

We have trained a cadre of "Machine Operators" through the past 20 or so years who can't do more than push buttons. SAD!!

I had a front row seat in 1980, when nothing else mattered except the bottom line from the pencil neck geeks who now run this country. Having been born in 1950 i was allowed to see the end of the Industrial USA. I went to trade school worked in machine shops and sheet metal shops in addition to Fortune 150 Corporations.

I went to college nights and worked my way up to the Manager Level. What a shame. The young people of today don't have a clue never mind a chance... we are a service economy alright, we make nothing invest nothing and will get what we deserve. You only get out, what you put in!

I have more initials after my name than the alphabet. I have three years until i start working at McDonalds flipping burgers (retire). Boy I can't wait. NOT! Thanks to all the MBS's for the memories. What machinists! Anyone who can now turn on a lathe calls himself a machinist and the pay rates are incredible, $14.00 per hour oh boy, i can drive a truck and make more. Everything goes in cycles. we will be back to the issues of 1918 again trust me and watch everyone scream when it happens when the blame each other for the "skilled craftsman" decay of the USA. Anyone have any comments about the Banks and what they have done to our economy... Just a thought.

Ah, a philosophical naysayer like myself. Yeah, we started out in the trenches went to school at night (I even faxed work and tests back and forth while working on the road for a major local Electrical Firm), studied, etc to achieve a satisfactory income. I still travel, love the trenches (No Political Office BS for Me), and will probably die in my tracks as I work Part-time. I watch the creative accounting and juggling, and I sometime suspect that if older accounting methods were used, most companies would be declared bankrupt. By the pencil neck geeks doings and methods.

Banks, another whole train of thoughts. Yes in plural.

Somewhere along the line common sense died and as I get some entry level inspectors and some "seasoned" ones on my gigs I can not believe the retention capabilities and lack of thinking ahead. Ah, gotta stop, I could be here all evening.

God, you must live in a rich part of the country. The local paper ran an ad last weekend looking for experienced set-up machinists at $8.50/hr. I'm guessing they'll have to run that several times, but it's a sign of how far down we've slid.

I see it all the time, lack of skilled labor. It is amazing who they will let poke buttons on a $800k machine. Then they wonder why they have problems...

Another thing I saw happen this year, the local Technical College did not run their machine tool program due to lack of enrollment. First time I've seen that happen in, well... never seen that happen before.

Machine shops are having a hard time finding people and they are more willing than ever to do OJT for millwrights and such. It is a shame that craftsmanship is being lost to simple button pushers.

I think that "Some say the U.S. is putting itself in line for a similar predicament" has been on the forefront for more than twenty (20) years now. As far as the machine trades are concerned, we are not training highly-skilled and competent journeyman machinists and toolmakers anymore, and have not for some time. Save for a few of the large job shops, virtually no one offers an apprentice training programme these days.

I have heard more than once "Well, I can make more money if I complete university in four (4) years than I can if I complete this apprenticeship." Yes, that is true if one's field of study is to be something more advanced (and needed!) than the general liberal arts degree. Of course we know that no degree (or any other level of training) guarantees success in this life. The are no substitutes for personal desire and will.

I should add that virtually none of us class 1A toolmakers can find a job anymore where we can make the same wage as a young, degreed mechanical engineer, as our ranks have been thinned first by the high usage of CNC machines and the lack of justification as presented by those so-called pencil-necked geeks. I still see weekly advertisements for journeyman toolmaker job candidates, for a hourly pay of $15.00/hour to $18.00/hour. What? Yes. if our wages had kept up with that of many other professionals a seasoned journeyman could command an annual earning of $60,000.00-$65,000.00 without much overtime.

Many of the toolmakers of my generation (essentially the last of the craft) opted to become programmers, as in the early days the CNC programmes were not very "smart" and needed a lot of input as far as speeds/feeds/material and/or part characteristics. But CNC programming tools have come a very long way in twenty (20) years so a lesser-skilled person can write decent programmes for general shop work.

But now just as then, university programmes are marketed to be more attractive to young faces and these faces are pointed in that direction by an education system that is quite ignorant in the knowlegde that excellent opportunities still exist for skilled tradesmen who successfully finish at the vocational and technical schools and follow this with further training and experience.

Okay, I'll digress and stop my rant!

Ing. Robert Forbus

Perhaps someone with your work experience should be learning programming to write the software for the next generation of CNC machines? You would understand the problems from both sides of the fence!!

Andy, I did not go that course through my career, but I did think about it. I completed my toolmaker's apprenticeship in the very early 1980's and the money was quite good. Afterwards I followed the natural career evolution where I directed my studies towards mechanical engineering, and became a "management type" where I oversaw the engineering machine-shop group.

And then I decided to burn the candle at each end and grasp the middle with hot pliers. From my mid 20's until I became 30 years old I taught an evening machine technology class at a technical school and continued to work to develop and apply training guidelines; not so much now for conventional machining, but for the CNC machines that were beginning to fill the toolmaking shops.

I remained involved in the training of a few more toolmakers and eventually became a chief engineer and went on to design a lot of equipment and supervise large machine build and construction projects. I essentially no longer worked in the craft but did remain intimately involved with it. My revelations about the reduced industrial training effort became painfully apparent each time that I interviewed toolmaker or machinist job candidates for an occassional job opening. Virtually all of them were "Button Pushers."

But I blame a lot of the skill shortage on shortsighted industrial leadership that seems to be the norm in the U.S.A. today. We see virtually no long-term planning in many companies and most seem to take the business one quarter at a time. Our market is of course continually changing so I do undertand where a bit of this mindset originates. Due to impact of CNC equipment the classification for "machinist" that once described a true all-round journeyman is now used to describe the youngster who pushes a few buttons and loads and unloads a CNC chucker or mill. Of course the rate of pay followed the diminished need of skills and virtually no hiring manager has an idea of what a true machinist or toolmaker is/was.

But there is still a need for finished craftsmen in a few places. For example, a friend of mine owns a large machining job shop and has a tremendous array of CNC machine tools in addition to his conventional machine tools. In conversation one day I asked whether his work load was concentrated moreso on the CNC side versus the conventional side, and his answer really surprised me. His conventional machining side was consistently busier and generated most of the shop's revenue.

I guess I am just at an age where I am beginning to understand the word "nostalgia" in feeling more than definition.

Regards,

Ing. Robert Forbus

Ah, you make me nostalgic for an old Bridgeport and watching some of those old timers mass produce items with hand built jigs or fixtures well exceeding the "Time Study Guy" predictions.

And then, the Button Pushers running 3 or more machines at the same time, ugh.

You are not to old to do exactly what I said, if you still have the drive!!

This is the time to go back into the profession,you'll be surprised what a true machinst is worth in todays market.

No the shortage will be mechanics to fix them and skilled machinists.

Management has taken the stand that they just need operators to run CNCs Machining centers and mill. They can pull any one of the street to do the job because in their mind you just put the part in and push the button. Their thought is it idiot proof.

Well their not idiot proof I spend many hour replacing tooling. Broken because material was put in wrong. Or run it into the clamps.

Though they may give them the title machinist they are just operators. If we were to gear up for war time production as in the article. Then i believe that there would be so many machines down due to mishaps and not enough mechanics to repair them. Any company that wished to go back to the manual mills would find themselves hurting to find qualified machinist to run them.