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Left - Parts are all cleaned in a gowned and capped clean room environment. Right - RKL’s Sokik wire EDM is cutting 164 parts at a time with three different operations. Freddy is one of RKL’s top programmers for the mills and runs their EDM department.
of these parts over the years,” tells Torry. “We are in the process of proving out the new machines on this single part. This newer technology will yield us big production gains. We were able to see a 15% reduction in cycle time right away. We’re estimating with a few more tweaks it will end up even faster. The Citizens will be repurposed for other jobs. They still hold tight tolerances and have earned a little break after so many years of dedicated service.”
“We’ve made a recent commitment to explore additive manufacturing,” explains Roy. “Right now, we are running secondary processes on 3D printed parts for other companies. Being 3D printed the parts require secondary work to meet the customers finish requirements. We see a lot of potential in this area and are evaluating purchasing our own machines in the near future. Pricing has come down a lot, but even so it is a large investment to acquire what we want.” They are weighing the pros and cons now of two systems: HP and GE. HP’s Multi Jet Fusion system for medical grade plastic and GE’s titanium or stainless- steel E-Beam Fusion system. “Pricing is on the high end, but if we can find the market for it, we will invest in the technology.”
MAKING A DIFFERENCE
Job satisfaction is important to everyone, but sometimes it is difficult to quantify and to witness first-hand results. Knowing the country relies on the parts you manufacture to ensure freedom around the globe can be a tremendous source of pride for any shop. However, it is not that often that living, breathing proof walks into your shop, but that is exactly what happened at RKL a few months back. “It’s interesting to learn the end use of our components and how they are integrated,” tells Kip. “It’s exciting to be a part of an industry that makes a difference in people’s lives. Just the
other day a delivery driver for one of our vendors came in and asked about the part he was picking up. This is a part that he has been picking up from RKL for the last 10 years. We explained to him that it is a component of a replacement heart valve. To both our surprise we figured out that he had been walking around this entire time with our component in his chest. All these years he was picking up and delivering a part that helped to keep him alive and didn’t even know it. We showed him how it was created on the machine and all the processes required for it to be ready to ship.” “He was so excited to see it being made,” adds Torry. “It meant a lot to all of us here too. We take quality very seriously but seeing what we make walk in and out of the shop everyday measures quality in a different way than our standard dimensional inspection ever could.” “What we manufacture makes a difference in people’s lives and we take that to heart,” concludes Roy. “From the top down we love what we do here at RKL.”
CNC WEST February/March 2021
www.CNC-West.com 37
Roy Hornstein - president, Kip Sullivan - business development manager, & Torry Lamp - quality assurance manager.