Machining Cast Iron? TOTAL PAIN! | Fixture Friday 17 | Pierson Workholding

[@BernhardVictorBrandstatter]

Been watching for years. Every episode is top notch.

[@PiersonWorkholding]

Thank you! We strive for absolute excellence in every aspect of business.

[@wrighty338]

One of the best machining channels

[@BenjaminCarlson1]

Videography - on point! Great tips, thanks for the quality videos and information!

[@jpfishing2900]

Great Slow-Motion Shots!

[@PiersonWorkholding]

I'm blown away every time I watch the pocketing toolpath. Cast Iron oxidizing and exploding in mid air like a firework!

[@gredangeo]

Excellent presented video as always. The Slo-mo was nicely done too. :)

[@ninjaabcde]

Hey man. Thank you again for all you're doing for us younger machinists. Really appreciate you paving the way for gen z manufacturers

[@adammiller4879]

Awesome video, it’s nice to see a machinist truly understand functionality of dimensioning and set ups

[@jackmclane1826]

It's a bliss to listen to experts! I'm a mechanical engineer and I'll never stop learning from expert machinists. To be really good together this must become a mutually beneficial relationship, but often it's loaded with ego fights and misunderstanding.

[@PiersonWorkholding]

The best engineers are machinists and the best machinists are engineers.

[@elong70]

Nice, and nice look at the quality and work that goes into your products

[@jackflash6377]

Great video! We use a ton of custom 18 x 18 x 2" pallets. To make them light enough to handle I do an isogrid on the backside. Love the Pro Pallet System !!! no telling how many parts we've made on them.

[@thekeyfox]

That’s a really good idea!! How would you say the isogrid affects rigidity?

[@jackflash6377]

@@thekeyfox I run all my big (18 x 18") fixtures with isogrid on the back to reduce weight. On the first fixtures I made, which were only 1" thick, no isogrid, I could measure 0.003" of deflection as I tightened up the pitbull clamps. Move to 2" thick and it dropped to less than 0.001". I see almost the same (just over 0.001") after cutting the isogrid on the backside. Isogrid is 1" deep, webs are 3/8" thick, Triangles are 2.250" per side. My mill operator thanks me everyday. 18 x 18 x 2" plate is heavy, throw on 6 pieces of stock at 8 x 4 x 1.75" and it really gets heavy.

[@angrydragonslayer]

Man, this makes me slightly glad that i've somehow ended up doing almost exclusively "you need a crane" or "you need a magnifying glass" stuff

[@sebastiantaylor2600]

Of course, thumbs up! It's a pleasure to see you in every video Jay!!!! Thanks to you for the tips, (we learn a lot) and your amazing team. Cheers from Buenos Aires, Argentina!!!

[@patrickpat8878]

For chips évacuation at the shop I have worked on every large CNC lathe and milling we have created a large pit hole in the ground then made a concrete sealed pool and and drop in a stainless steel reservoir for the cooling system. So instead of having 10 to 20 gallons of tool cooling fluid we have 200 to 300 gallons, and for chips evacuation we have a separate system that pour lot of cooling fluid on the working tool . And here in Quebec the ground in permanently at 10-15 degrees C*

[@Awfultyming]

Awesome video thanks for the content. My shop is using your pallets for lots of products and really changed how operators run parts

[@RHINORyan92]

Thank you for sharing!

[@xed5204]

LOVE the slo mo.

[@MG-gj6vh]

Dzieki wielkie Pierson za naukę, śledzę i obserwuję a moja firma po mału rośnie w siłę ;) Zajebiście! ;)

[@PiersonWorkholding]

👍

[@mh73020]

Awesome video thanks

[@richhuntsd12]

Very well done Jay. Are You sending the cores out for Blanchard grinding? Have You considered bringing that in house? It’s really nice having a good grinder in house. I appreciated the concise content of this video. Thank You

[@texasermd1]

Great video. Love the thumbnail. 😲 What video editor do you use BTW? Cool plugins. Also, how many parts would you need to make to consider acquiring a Blanchard grinder of your own? I learned a lot about them after watching the recent NYC CNC video of the Bourn & Koch factory tour and have personal experience with such a product in the ATP 5 plate I purchased to replace the heated bed on my 3D printer. Thumbs up applied!

[@PiersonWorkholding]

Blanchard grinding requires a very skilled and experienced operator. It is also INCREDIBLY dirty. For these reasons alone we'll outsource as long as possible.

[@texasermd1]

@@PiersonWorkholding That makes sense. Thanks for the reply. 👍🏼👍🏼

[@choateengineeringperformance]

Love your videos, keep it up!

[@yellvett76]

Thanks Jay great info as usual, We love ours We just have to utilize it more.

[@PiersonWorkholding]

✅ Tired of making one part at a time? 👉 bit.ly/3HBWKoQ

[@chrisrokz9005]

Nice video. Did you consider getting waterjet durabar? Probably got it all dialed in by now.

[@dtm8073]

I picked one tip from this video, retrain operator to wipe bottom of fixture before loading if you want accuracy.

[@SeabassEngineering]

Awesome!

[@MrRosalez23]

good info

[@hampfi747]

Very cool video. Thanks for the insight. Would it work to clamp the parts for op 10 with two clamps through the holes to contour the outside and drill all holes on the backside? It may be possible to save the op0 that way. And pallet use the parts also for op10

[@PiersonWorkholding]

We've tried a lot of approaches including the one you mentioned. Notice the pallet has tapped holes at the center of the two large bores. We used to clamp down on the bores to machine the features but the methods featured in the video ended up being the most reliable and fastest method of production.

[@hampfi747]

@@PiersonWorkholding thanks for the response. Yeah the clamp must spare out the holes and be clocked in the fixture to not be able to set them on incorrectly and block the hole locations. Then make the fixture a little bigger and of steel to increase the ridgidety to place two op10 and two op20 parts on it and you eliminated two setups, two cnc Programms and have a one piece flow with no batches 👍🏼

[@kevind1865]

Have you set up anything to try and deal with the cast iron sludge in the VMC you run them on?

[@PiersonWorkholding]

Yes we run dual canister 20 micron filters in parallel after the coolant pump. Scroll way back through our IG for part numbers.

[@kevind1865]

@@PiersonWorkholding Thank you for the reply! Do you find that keeps most of the sludge from building up in the tank, or do you just call it the cost of doing cast iron and clean it every 6 mo?

[@PiersonWorkholding]

There's no preventing cast iron, or any chip material, from getting in the tank. We use an Eriez sump cleaner after cast iron runs to clean and filter the tank. The filters I mentioned earlier keep the cast iron out of the coolant lines only.

[@tshumay]

Hey Jay - Love this. I have some cast iron parts that come through my shop periodically and always struggle with the chip evacuation and keeping the dust down. Since you machine a lot of cast iron, I was wondering if you have tips for managing dust and/or maintaining coolant when machining cast iron?

[@PiersonWorkholding]

Yes. We filmed dry for the sake of video but always run coolant. We also filter our coolant and change filters every 8 hours when running C.I. Scroll back through our Instagram for our DIY coolant filtration for under $200.

[@tshumay]

@@PiersonWorkholding Ace. Thanks so much. I’ll have a look for that coolant video right now. I have really been struggling with the dust. Cutting it is no problem, but the nasty film and dust left everywhere has me thinking twice about doing more. I was hesitant to use coolant because of the contamination, but a filtration system would mitigate that. Thanks!

[@PiersonWorkholding]

@@tshumay Here's a link: instagram.com/p/BavvinOFfBP/

[@tshumay]

@@PiersonWorkholding Thanks! Ordered up the parts today. Goodbye graphite dust! I will not miss it.

[@jonwatte4293]

How much price difference would there be to make it out of A36/hot rolled instead of cast iron? You'd presumably need less surface work and external grinding. Or maybe you're after the slightly more dampened material of the cast iron?

[@PiersonWorkholding]

Good question. Compared to A36, cast iron is less expensive, it cuts like butter (long tool life), and is very thermally stable. Plus it has a dampening factor 20x greater than steel.

[@jonwatte4293]

@@PiersonWorkholding yeah if you need the dampening, that'll do it!

[@smac5]

I believe the correct term is damping.

[@kvom01]

I didn't see where/how you drill the locator holes for the pins in the casting.

[@PiersonWorkholding]

We didn't show it, but I mentioned it at 1:47. We hold the parts in a double vise to add all holes for Op1. Specifically, we drill then ream the holes for the locating pin.

[@koushikmalik1762]

Nice

[@billb295]

Why are these parts cast?

[@PiersonWorkholding]

Cast as opposed to....?

[@hugonix03]

Dirty? Try dry machining graphite ;)

[@PiersonWorkholding]

I can only imagine! No thanks.

[@tubbytimmy8287]

I don't understand this... Why not design the system to be more like Zero Clamp or VERO-S? Where the customer just screw in some male-anchors on the bottom. Is that not basically what's going on anyway? What am I missing?

[@Foomanlol]

Much more expensive to do it like a vero-S, and if it were not cheaper than Vero-S system then there wouldn't be much of a value proposition. The Pierson setup is quite a bit cheaper than a VERO-S system if you are satisfied with the pallet sizes. I actually own a 6 module Vero-s which is quite expensive because I absolutely needed that style configuration.

[@dtm8073]

I just got a quote for Vero-S and let me tell you it's very expensive. You get a lot more for your dollar with this product. I'm in the process of placing an order.

[@themattrixrevolution]

its all fun and games until you stripped a shoulder bolt

[@PiersonWorkholding]

To expand on your comment, we use 3/8-16 helicoil inserts and torque drills. With that combination, you'll literally get 100,000 cycles before considering replacing components.

[@captaincaveman471]

Cast iron is one of the easiest metals to machine 🤔

[@PiersonWorkholding]

Machines like butter! Holding it is what this video is about.