What words of advice do you give to new machinist.

[Kevin45]

What advice do you give to new machinist when breaking them in? Myself I tell them that they have to read the machinery, read the tools, and read the material. They kind of look at me puzzled but I explain to them that they have to read it like a book. Learn the characteristics of the machine. When you learn the characteristics then you know what that machine is doing if someone else is on it or if it is running with your back turned. Know what faults the machine has. Backlash, etc. Then you know how to compensate for it. Read your tools. Then you know what or what not the tool is capable of. How much will an endmill flex. What happens when it flexes? Read your drill. What makes them cut? Why does a tool cut better one way than another? Read your materials. Why does this type of steel cut better than this type? Cut it at high speed, cut it at low speed, play with it to learn what it does with different variables. Once they learn how to read all three then the compensation falls into place. When one of my co-workers are machining a part I can tell what mistakes they are making from across the room just by the sound of their machine. Quite a few people take machining for granted. This is a cutter and it cuts metal. I look at machining as an art form. Taking a raw block of metal and turning it into a workable, functional piece. One thing I will always remember when I was broke in as a Modelmaker. The older gentleman told me to get some material and cut away everything that doesn't look like the print.

Kevin

[SGW]

Cultivate Patience.

[jero100]

One word....listen.
That old machinist was has been there forever
has been there forever for a reasson.
Vocational school teaches you the safety and the principles of the craft.An exceelant starting point.
The old guys teach you the real world where time and pressure are a factor.

[Alistair Hosie]

SGW
That response you just gave is as far as I am concerned the best advice I have ever read.No I am not insulting you with a cheap remark.As most of you already know I spent most of my life working in Dentistry Unfortunately people don't often realise the pressure there is in that industry.
The day is broken into fifteen minute slots some patients have double slots i.e half an hour and so on.Unfortunately when things go wrong as they often do and a patient requires a bit more time than another the slots get overfilled and then pressure builds up pattients get irritable if they have to wait and so on .The result of this is that all of my working life I have had to cope with three or four things at the same time if an appliance is in a particular prssure pot curing you can't wait four minutes till its done you have to do something else during that time and so on and on the result is that you get into a bad habit of rushing around.I actually have taught myself to work better over these years under this pressure than when not. When I retired I found myself taking up a long awaited dream of building a shop and doing woodworking and light metal working.Trouble is all these years have taught me some bad habbits I have become terribly impatient and lose the joy of taking my time and just concentrating on the job in hand.I sometimes end up rushing for no good reason.I mean it it is very difficult for me to relax and enjoy myself with this I have had to teach myself all over again to slow down and remind myself that nobody is waiting for the end result. I am getting slowly better but it takes time before I can relax and really enjoy myself when I start a job.I therefore thank you for your very wise comment and hope that I will overcome this eventually as the years go on regards Alistair

[mayfieldtm]

1)Park the apprentice squarely in front of the Lathe.
2)Have him insert the Chuck Key.

3)Have him start the Chuck Motor.

4)After the key bounces off his forehead, he will never do that again.

Tom M.

P.S. If you ever see the Master with a big honking lump between the eyes... Don't ask!



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[SGW]

For me, it's pretty simple. When I'm impatient in the shop, I screw up. Every time.

[Al Messer]

That makes two of us! And I thought I was all alone on that score!!

[Al Messer]

Alistair-- So, you are what our black Brethern call a "Toof Dentist"?

[Spin Doctor]

The single best piece of advice you can give the grunt when he's just starting out is if you never screw up your not going to learn anything and when you do screw up, stop and think IS THERE ANYWAY I CAN FIX THIS
Every apprentice I've ever seen has a tendency after about four months to think he knows it all. Let them get them selves in deep doodoo and suddenly they find out they don't. I know I did and I still don't

[docsteve66]

one of the more competant machinst i knew always lubricated each new machine, cleaned it if possible. Said that gave him a chance to inspect carefully, move every part to its limits, feel for loosness, drag , strange sounds, inspect dials, backlash etc. Good advice for buying a car or taking a wife i think.

Every worker, apprentice or not, should always be aware the EVERY job had three parts and its not done till the last one is done. The parts are : (1) Make ready (2) do (3) put away. a big job is just a series of litte jobs, each with the same elements. The money is made more in parts 1 and 3 than part 2.

The make ready starts at birth, includes getting knowledge, being fit to work, getting sleep,rest and food.

think of cutting a thread- more time(by far) was spent making ready (getting proper materials, sharpening a tool, setting up, knowing the TPI, minor major dia on and on), very litle time was spent asctually cutting. and thats why production lines beat individual craftsmanship- the makeready cost is spread over many items. Thats why we need the "oldtimer" who has every trick of the trade plus other trades and may not be able to make production for a jillion reasons.

"Why do we always have time to do the job twice when we did not havetime to do it right the first time?"

[darryl]

Be patient, you can always come back to a project later. I learned, (am still learning) that you screw up when you're tired, forget a critical safety issue, jam the endmill through too quickly cause you're almost done, go lax on the accuracy of what you're doing, yadayada. The enjoyment is in the process perhaps more so than in the end product. Relax. Know you're going to make mistakes, break things, waste materials, and have to replace some tools before their time. Don't sweat it. Don't be stoned or drunk around machinery. Do ask advice, try things, radical things, sometimes, too. Be eager to find out why that dimention didn't come out right, that toolbit didn't cut properly, etc. For me, there's a strong element of discovery, oh, that's what happened, I see! Or, hey, there's a way I could do it! Be respetful of power. Machines don't care if they spill your blood. One more thing, tell us what you're working on from time to time.

[Alistair Hosie]

Patience is not an easy thing when you have a schedule to meetI am fortunate these days in that respect.Money is involved and if you have enough customers to be able to tell the ones who rush you constantly that you're not interested then life will be fine.But for most people the cutomer is almost God and that in todays world means stress.I am very thankful to God that as I am now retired I am not in that position however all the years of being under that stress is as I say very difficult for me to get out of the habit of .A job whatever you do will lose a part of the magic if you get like this and as I am a hobbyist in my shop that kind of becomes couter productive as I built the place to relax and enjoy and for no other reason that's all I am saying.There is one thing that's for sure having a shop where you can go and have this time to yourself is as close to paradise on earth as it gets as I just love it.
Sometimes when I am not so able I just go and sit there and look around me at all my tools then I get up and re-organize something for a few minutes and then sit down again and so on .I am glad that when I feel okay I can just do as I please freedom. No telephones, no boss, no hurry, no worry, no hassle, no patients, sometimes as I say there will be no production ,at least till tomorrow or the next day or even sometimes the next and so on but that's okay most times I'm making dust I wish you all as stress free a life as is practical.I also like buying old tools eqipment and bringing it back to life thats not exactly what I mean how can I phrase it better trying I suppose to get it back to better than new those shiney moving metal parts always have fascinated me those old boys who invented them really knew what they were doing I still would like to get into ornamental /rose engine turning Holzapfell stuff still one day.Alistair

[Thrud]

Steve
"Why do we always have time to do the job twice when we did not have time to do it right the first time?"

Because when we forget the past we are doomed to repeat it. Do you remember the first time you screwed it up? My point exactly.

[Axel]

The advice so far is great, but my first advice to a beginer would be: ORDNUNG! Can't have a shop looking like a scrapyard! Can't work if you don't find those tools!

[wdtom]

I have heard this refered to " as making friends with the machine".