Industrial Businesses Megathread

[machinistguy]

Thought I'd create a thread to encourage people still figuring out what to do to seriously consider industrial businesses that keep the world running but nobody ever hears about.

I'll start by posting three different examples.

1. This is a tour of Diamondback Industries making explosives for the oil & gas industry near where I am.

2. This is a tour of a propeller manufacturer in Detroit.

3. This is a maker of carbide cutting tools. I buy from them because they're the only name brand where I don't need a WW2 cryptographer to navigate their site, they list their pricing online, and they're just so easy to work with.


Anybody else with industrial businesses they want to share go ahead!

 

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[machinistguy]

Any chemists or students with a penchant for chemistry? @Spenny aren't you a chem student? Here's a few more ideas from a small corner of my shop.

Cutting fluids. They're supposed to cool the tool and workpiece, flush chips, and lubricate the cut. You could formulate some to be better for specific alloys, work better with hard water etc... I've yet to find one I like that also doesn't mess up brass 360 if you don't clean it off real quick. It's why most people run brass dry even though coolant would help.


There's also various oils and greases to reduce friction and wear and tear of mechanical parts. Can you make something that works better for certain mechanical components and materials?

 

[Spenny]

Aha very interesting question. I initially though that the zinc in the brass would be reacting with the high pH presence (9 pH) that makes it unfit for machining, but I found this semi synthetic solution that claims to be suitable for cutting brass & copper? Please tell me if its not suitable, this could be an opportunity to add value.

It seems to be that sulfur (comes naturally from crude oil & ends up in your cutting lubricant) is the problem. They also add chlorinated compounds in to improve the viscosity & that can cause issues aswell.

Your problem can be well summarised by this bit below. The English version is "sulfur forms acidic compounds that eat at your metal". Zinc & copper are particularly susceptible.


The link I posted to removes this sulfur element through a separate process I believe. Should then be ok to use with soft metals.

 

[machinistguy]

I'm on my third coolant. All 3 said it was brass safe. One even advertised it as only for non-ferrous materials including brass, yet here we are. Didn't know it was the sulfur though, they all had it, I'll make sure the next one doesn't contain any. Thanks @Spenny !

Note to people looking for ideas:
2. China: The link to the company @Spenny posted is Chinese. I don't know anyone in their right mind that buys Chinese products when it's important, and 100% not if they don't have a local distributor, so don't let competition from China dissuade you. Everything is part of a larger system, and if things go wrong, it doesn't matter if it's a $50 product, everything else gets effected and I need replacement parts right now and shipped overnight, I need a technical service hotline with zero communication issues to troubleshoot ASAP. The opportunity cost of something going wrong is far larger than the price of the product much less the delta in what you'll charge vs China. Plus, the ROI from something that performs better than random stuff justifies a higher price. Most of the name brands for a lot of industrial products are US, Swiss/German, or Japanese. You bet they charge extra but it's worth it. Only a few Chinese.

1. Products for working Non-ferrous materials: My experience in general has been companies will do all their testing on Aluminum 6061 since that's the majority of the market, and then only check if it'll work theoretically for the other stuff without any real testing. Same with cutting tools. Nature of the beast when you have dozens to thousands of SKUs, but an opportunity for any entrepreneur.

 

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[Filippos]

I don't know anyone in their right mind that buys Chinese products when it's important

hahaha love this

your posts are pure gold

 

[machinistguy]

New Materials or Better Common Ones:
If you're thinking all materials are the same or people just buy the cheapest stainless steel they can find instead of very specific alloys with very specific value skews, then think again. If you're a chemist, material scientist, engineer, etc... why not come up with a new patented, proprietary alloy that is better at a specific task, or come up with way to manufacture a popular common alloy.

Hastelloy, Inconel, Monel:
All these are nickel super alloys with various grades developed for the aerospace industry. Somewhere out there is an engineer trying to deal with a scenario that needs high heat, corrosion, pressure, and other crazy resistances only found in the most extreme environments. Help him out!

AMPCOLOY:
This one is a series of proprietary copper alloys maximize thermal conductivity while maintaining other properties needed for various industries. Not much else to it. They figured out a way to make it easier for engineers to hit certain properties they need for their applications, so now those engineers require their designs be made with these alloys.

SS 304:
Stainless Steel 304 is one of the most common alloys out there because it's an affordable, food-safe alloy making it big in the food industry. Engineers will pick it for its affordability and corrosion resistance. But its a nightmare to machine because of how easily it hardens while cutting it and is very inconsistent in its work hardening properties. So why not start a SS304 mill that is able to make stable bars of it consistently. You could sell it for higher, because the improved manufacturing process makes the cutting properties consistent from one bar to the next, meaning less broken tools and time wasted, meaning cheaper final result. Or come up with an alternative proprietary alloy.

 

[Filippos]

SS 304:
Stainless Steel 304 is one of the most common alloys out there because it's an affordable, food-safe alloy making it big in the food industry. Engineers will pick it for its affordability and corrosion resistance. But its a nightmare to machine because of how easily it hardens while cutting it and is very inconsistent in its work hardening properties. So why not start a SS304 mill that is able to make stable bars of it consistently. You could sell it for higher, because the improved manufacturing process makes the cutting properties consistent from one bar to the next, meaning less broken tools and time wasted, meaning cheaper final result. Or come up with an alternative proprietary alloy.

The manufacturing process will be very slow in this case because you won't be able to use a high feed rate or cutting depth. So this will be more dependent on the machine tool stiffness. Of course, you can also place the part so that you use the higher stiffness in the direction along the axis of the end mill, but you'll still get chatter in the direction of the feed rate if you go too fast. There are solutions though to increase productivity and reduce process costs, such as add on dampers. You'll just have to make sure to place them on the least stiff part along the stiffness loop of the machine tool (usually the headstock or the cross-bridge)

 

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[Filippos]

It would definitely make sense though to get a Stainless steel alloy with similar properties and better machinability or a cheaper alloy with the properties of the copper alloy, especially for EV manufacturing.

 

[Eurojanek]

Hi guys!
I rank this topic: trapezoidal thread, because it's solid
It's a breath of fresh air for me after all this apps and socialmedia businesses.
I'll be picking in here frequently, however will not contribute much,
as I left the CNC industry a decade ago due to my health problems
connected to usage of cutting fluids.
I was doing aerospace Aluminium alloys and Titanium mostly, steel alloys not so much.
I'm still in heavy industry though, but switched since to B2B sales.
The CNC easily fulfills the CENT'S commandments.

On top of that, there are possibilities for usage of AI for creating products on CNC Machines. Not just for writing your G-Code but to create complex geometry for design solution that your regular CAD-Engineer couldn't wrap his head around. I think some bicycle manufacturers already use it that way.

As for now I'm running a few side gigs. Two of them involve chemistry (I freaking love chemistry).
I realized one day that combining some interdisciplinary knowledge from separate fields with some creative thinking can create great solutions. So I took Idea that was on my mind for a long time for a hydrolic problem I had to solve with chemistry. It worked wonders. I was so surprised how great it worked that I almost got paralyzed what to do with it next. The solution is easy to implement cheap, would help the industry save billions of dollars on maintenance and heating costs, but is rather easy to be hijacked from me and replicated as soon as I release it to the world. So I'm diving now in pattent laws before I make any more moves.
The other gig involves wood threatment chemical solution, but needs at least 1 Year to be fully tested. I'm in a second month now.

 

[B-qiri]

I'm not in this industry but we had a few CNC machinist as neighbours and I did work with a 3-axe CNC machine for stone carving.

From what I understood there is a MASSIVE inquiry for special parts and for CNC machines in general in Switzerland. The problem is that nobody wants to do this kind of work and delivery time from outsourcing takes too long while the quality also isn't always the best.

That's in Switzerland at least. Have you guys made the same experience?

 

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[Mikkel]

The solution is easy to implement cheap, would help the industry save billions of dollars on maintenance and heating costs, but is rather easy to be hijacked from me and replicated as soon as I release it to the world. So I'm diving now in pattent laws before I make any more moves.
The other gig involves wood threatment chemical solution, but needs at least 1 Year to be fully tested. I'm in a second month now.

Is it easy to hijack because the solution is simple to make and they just need to add some sort of additive or is it easy to hijack because you have to sell a small item that would make things more efficient?

I'm no chemist, but after talking to a lab about testing a mixture of chemicals to ensure the quality and safety of the chemicals used, they told me it is nearly impossible to reverse engineer chemical formulas.

Chemists of the forum, let me know if this is incorrect.

However, if that is true, and your adding some sort of additive to the hydrollic fluid, then it sounds more like a trade secret where you just have to keep your mouth shut in regards to how to make the product. If you don't tell people how to make it, people cannot reverse engineer it, which would make the patent unnecessary.

 

[Eurojanek]

Is it easy to hijack because the solution is simple to make and they just need to add some sort of additive

That.

At the moment I'm finished with safety tests. I let the solution run in a central heating of a 1 family house for a year. No issues whatsoever. It only needs to be applied for max 3 days, then drained and replaced by original fluid, but I wanted to be sure it causes no damage to steel, copper rubber or PP, PVC etc. Also from my chemical knowledge I know it is 100% safe, but tested is tested.
Now Im contacting a few prospects in cities near me, Will do some demo houses probably even for free, also train 2 people to do it and work for me on a commission basis. Will be listening carefully to customers feedback and the I'll take it from that.

Originally I planned to sell a digital "how to" brochure eventually upsell it with a ready set of accessories and solution needed for the procedure.

But I'd like to do it for a few custommers myself and hear what they say. Because I suspect people would be glad to have it done for them rather than doing it themself, as it requires a bit of knowledge and handywork to do it properly.

Maybe I'll end up having a team of personell doing it for me.

 

[Spenny]

I'm no chemist, but after talking to a lab about testing a mixture of chemicals to ensure the quality and safety of the chemicals used, they told me it is nearly impossible to reverse engineer chemical formulas.

Chemists of the forum, let me know if this is incorrect.

Yeah it's pretty damn difficult to tell what people have used unless there is a breach of NDA contracts. There is a way you can get around this, pushing a certain direction for a chemical or technology that you know exists from past companies.

But identifying a specific compound? Good luck with that, even in synthesis with pure chemicals and a chemical route it's hard enough to characterise your product. With a formulation, you get messy NMRs, IRs and impurities on top of a mix that maybe hard to separate.

Generally the best thing to do is find a problem with the formulation that exists, research a suitable solution and perhaps patent the new technology.

 

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