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Quality EDM - Company News |
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Since Quality EDM opened in 1993 with just two EDMs and three employees, the company has grown and prospered. Recently, Quality EDM purchased its own building in an industrial park in Anaheim Hills, CA.
The buildings white exterior is crisp and fresh against the blue sky. A freshly paved parking lot is filled with late-model cars. Inside the plant, there's plenty of fresh air and light. Quality EDM takes advantage of its location in the warm-weather climate of Southern California, opening up the spacious drive through bays during the day to admit plenty of fresh air and sunshine. The company has been growing rapidly during the seven years it has in business. Founder and president, Mike Gervais, had an EDM operator himself, and believed EDM had a strong future. But he wanted to be his own boss and needed to work in an environment with a strong commitment to product quality. When he opened Quality EDM's doors in 1993, he started out with two EDM machines and three machinists. Today, the company has twenty EDMs (wire, sinker and fast-hole types), 10 employees, and has recently purchased its own 9,000 square-foot building. Annual sales are approaching $5 million. Quality EDM handles a huge variety of jobs, according to Gervais. "We make tooling for oil drilling, stents for angioplasties, hypodermic needles, fuel injectors for space shuttles, and molds for plastic injection molding. The molds we've made have been used for all kinds of things-from medical supplies like IV tubing, to fun stuff, like the molds for Kool Aid drinks." The company's customers also run the gamut, from players like Boeing, Textron, and Parker Hannifin in the aviation sector to Johnson & Johnson in the medical sector. The company handles some exacting work. "We make some very small holes to .006 with tolerances of .0001 inches in diameter," Gervais says. A substantial quantity of the work Quality EDM does involves finishing parts that will be used in aviation, primarily in the hydraulic systems within the aircraft that control moving the parts, such as raising or lowering wing flaps, or extending or retracting landing gear. |
"We do a lot of manifolds and a lot of hydraulic sleeve and slide assemblies. On parts like these, you have ports that have to connect in order for the part to function properly. If they don't meet, the flow of hydraulic fluid through the part is restricted and the part won't do its work."
Just one manifold may have as many as ten or twenty intersecting ports, each at a different location and angle, each requiring a different setup. With so many different steps required to finish such a labor-intensive part, there's abundant opportunity for something to go wrong at one step or another. "Suppose I'm burning a hole in sideways, maybe five inches down inside the bore. This is a perfect example of where EDM is required, because it would be impossible for a machinist to drill inside the bore. But lets say that there's some wear on the bottom of the electrode, and the hole you're making doesn't go all the way through to the connecting port. In a case like that, you won't be able to detect the problem with the naked eye, because the ports are recessed deep within the manifold. The problem may go unnoticed until the customer receives the part, tests it, and finds that it doesn't have the correct pressure readings."
Quality EDM Staff Monitor Wire EDM Machines
Checking the progress of setups on the Sodick AP500 wire EDMs in the Quality EDM plant in Anaheim Hills, CA, are (front to rear) Sammy Cordero, machinist; Todd Egan, wire EDM operator and programmer, and Thanh C. Tien, machinist. |
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The Bore scope and video monitor provides the magnification that makes it easy for Quality control to check the surface finish of a hydraulic sleeve, and detect any chips or jagged edges of metering slots. |
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At Ease
Mike Gervais, president of Quality EDM, has been an EDM operator himself, but wanted to be his own boss and to work in a company that put quality first. Founded in 1993, Quality EDM today has annual sales approaching $5 million.
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A problem like this is not just embarrassing, but costly. Gervais points out, "It's a little late when they call you down after you've done the job. You can produce a whole batch of parts and ship them to the customer before finding out about the problem-and instead of having one bad part, you might have 100! That's major!" or many EDM shops, a spoiled batch can be worth hundreds of dollars in time, labor and materials. The EDM shop is expected to absorb the entire cost of the rejected part, including all the labor that went into the piece before it arrived for finishing at the EDM facility.It didn't take many experiences like this to persuade Gervais that a bore scope was a good investment. After discussing his needs with a supplier, Gervais selected the HawkeyeÒ Precision Bore scope made by Gradient Lens Corp. The bore scope gives clear, sharp images for a modest price, because they are made with a new technology. The lenses are made with rods of chemically created treated glass called gradient-index or GRIN. Most glass lenses bend light only at their surfaces. Because a GRIN rod bends light continuously along its entire length, engineers can simplify the design of optical systems. Fewer lenses do the work of many, reducing costs. Since Gervais bought the bore scope and implemented a 100% inspection policy in his plant, they have had no more rejected parts. The policy has paid many dividends in customer satisfaction, and in winning new bids. "If your customers know you have the same ability to do the job."Machinists at Quality EDM use the bore scope in several ways. Most of the time, they connect it to a video system so they can see an enlarged view of the part's ID. With the probe reaching deep into the interior of the part, they can check for connecting ports or examine metering edges inside hydraulic sleeves to verify that they're perfect, sharp, and free of burrs. At other times, the machinists use the scope by eye, right out on the floor. "You can also use it with a lathe with a digital readout to check locations and metering edges of hydraulic sleeves", Gervais says. |
 "You put the part into a lathe, then you stick the bore scope in there, you set the zero on your digital, and then you it in and it will show you exactly where spots are. That's how all the big companies have it set up. They'll set the digital at zero and start coming in with the probe to check all the linear dimensions. The digital readout tells them exactly where the part is placed. On the metering slots on hydraulic sleeves, we use the bore scope to detect damages on the inside of the bores and the metering edges, like a chip. These parts are sometimes nitrited, which produces a brittle coating. After the EDM process, chips may occur, which will force us to scrap the part. The bore scope will allow us to see if a starter hole isn't cleaning up. Or if there are any chips around the edges, or any inconsistencies.
Gervais has found his Hawkeye bore scope useful not only to check the finished piece of work, but to check setup too. If a mistake is going to happen, it will most likely occur during setup. "Lots of things can happen.
The EDM electrode can cut into a part of a rim it was not supposed to touch, or the holder touches and damages an internal surface and you can't visually see it with the eye." So at each setup, the operator puts a test piece in the machine to run the operation, and then inspects it carefully with the bore scope afterward. Once he has made any adjustments to the setup that are necessary, he runs the operation on the rest of the batch, with more confidence that errors won't occur. Inspecting carefully during setup minimizes scrap later. This is an important part of cost control for us, since we're working with very expensive parts," Gervais explains. Visitors to Quality EDM are likely to run into the company's motto, framed and hanging prominently on the wall. It says, "Quality is never an accident. It is always the result of high attention, sincere effort, intelligent direction and skillful execution; it represents the wise choice of many alternatives." For Gervais, having the Hawkeye has made financial sense, while giving the company a better way of living up to its quality commitment. |
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