CNC West Feb March 2019

CNC WEST February/March 2019 www.CNC-West.com 23 B ob Lewis Machine began in 1973 as a one-man operation out of a garage in Torrance, Ca. Bob, AKA “Pops” would churn out thousands of parts from a tiny workspace. Bob Lewis Machine has come a long way since those garage days. With 5 axis milling and multi turret lathes, the AS9100 and ISO9001 certified shop is a trusted supplier to the most respected names in aerospace. Pops’ big break came when Hughes Aircraft contract- ed with him to start manufacturing a family of parts. He opened an actual shop in Gardena, and then moved to a larger location in the mid 80’s. “We moved here in 1986,” tells Jeff Lewis, Bob’s son and current president at Bob Lewis Machine. “I’ve been with the company since I was 6 years old. Pops had my sisters and I in a manufacturing assembly line. He would get in an order for 1000 parts and one of us would drill it, the next kid would tap it. My older sister got the most complex jobs, apparently an 8-year-old was more skilled than a 6-year-old. You can image by the time I was done with high school I had enough of machin- ing business and went out to do other things. I quit a few times, got fired a couple times, but it was all I knew grow- ing up. I did everything from being a DJ to a deck hand on fishing boats, but ultimately I came back to work for him and took over the business when Pops retired in 2001.” Bob Lewis Machine (BLM) specializes in high preci- sion prototype work for the aerospace industry. They machine mostly out of titanium and aluminum, but also work with copper and the exotic nickel bases super alloys like Inconel. The majority of parts produced are under the size of a softball, and a standard run might be only a few pieces. Business has been on an upswing the last few years and Jeff has taken the opportunity to invest in new equipment. In the last year Jeff purchased a new Hyun- dai WAI KF5600 3 axis mill, a Hyundai WAI E160a com- pact turning center and a Chevalier QP5X-400 5 axis mill. “We replaced a couple older machines with new ones,” explains Marcelo, head programmer and floor manager at BLM. “Our milling department has five Fadals, the new Hyundai, the new Chevalier 5 axis, a Nissin 5 axis, and a Kiwa horizontal. Turning has the new Hyundai, an Okuma, a Mori and a Hitachi. We are going more and more towards pallet systems and 5th axis machining. Our horizontal Kiwa has two pallets and there are half a dozen jobs he is setting up on it right now. Even though we are not a production driven shop, the ability to work offline while the machine is still cutting is paramount. It never stops running. We can switch between jobs if we need to because so many are set up on the pallets.” Reducing setups has been a priority ever since they added their first 5 axis Nissin in 2011. Jobs that took six or seven setups are now only taking one. It made a huge difference in how parts were produced. “We came to grips