Free for AGMA members – Trade shows are starting to come alive again and that means you need to have a significant marketing plan in place to get ready! Far too often, manufacturers sign up for a booth space and then do not do any digital or print marketing in advance to draw people to their booth. Trade Show experts, Carrie Schultz, Principal, CSG Creative and Jenny Blackford, VP, AGMA Business Management Division are going to share some tips for engaging customers before the show, during the show and after the show to help generate the leads necessary to make it a great ROI.

Last chance to join other executives in the gear and bearing industries for important presentations and valuable networking at this year’s Annual Meeting.

AGMA
Taught by Powertrain Gears and Bearings Technical Expert at Ford Motor Company, the purpose of this course is to cover the concurrent design and analyses of gears and bearings in integrated systems like gearboxes, transmissions, and electric motor drives so as to allow for good integration and faster optimization of the overall system.

For the last 10 years, the AGMA Foundation has been able to provide more than 60 scholarships totaling more than $300,000. These scholarships are only possible through the generous donations of members in our industry. More than 86% of all recipients are still working in the gear field. Help us give more and get more of these engineers into our industry. Consider a donation today.

Today’s Motor Vehicles
December 2020 U.S. cutting tool consumption totaled $157.3 million, according to the U.S. Cutting Tool Institute (USCTI) and AMT – The Association for Manufacturing Technology. This total, as reported by companies participating in the Cutting Tool Market Report collaboration, was up 4% from November’s $151.3 million and down 16% when compared with the $187.2 million reported for December 2019. With a year-to-date total of $1.9 billion, 2020 was down 22.2% when compared with December 2019.

ThomasNet
General Motors has partnered with Navistar to provide Hydrotec fuel cell power cubes for Navistar's International RH fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEV). A pair of Hydrotec power cubes will power Navistar's FCEV. Each cube contains more than 300 hydrogen fuel cells, thermal and power management systems and can provide about 80 kilowatts of power. The cubes can also be arrayed in two-to-three units per vehicle, depending on power demands. According to GM, the proprietary controls increase battery and fuel cell life while also improving cold-start performance. 

Robotics and Automation News
IoT Analytics, a provider of market insights and competitive intelligence for the internet of things (IoT) and Industry 4.0, surveyed the industrial IoT market and found that almost one-third of manufactures are planning to move their manufacturing execution software to the cloud, significantly boosting the global Cloud MES market growth for the coming years.

Gear Technology
Atlanta Gear Works has grown its engineering department by hiring mechanical engineer John B. Conway, BME, MBA, MSF. Conway is the third generation of the Conway family to work for the company founded by his father and grandfather in 1988. A graduate of Auburn University, Conway spent his college summers as an AGW engineering intern, working in all parts of the business from engineering and production to field service at major manufacturing plants throughout the Southeast.

Mining.com
Researchers at Australia’s Monash University found that the rare earth cerium affects the fate of a key reaction in copper, gold, silver and uranium mineralization. In a paper published in the journal Nature Communications, the scientists explain that, in the past, it was believed that ore fluids picked up some cerium on their way to giant deposits. Their findings, however, show that trace elements can have an important, yet difficult to predict, effect on the coupling between fluid flow, creation of porosity and mineral dissolution and precipitation. This effect controls large-scale element mobility and rheology in the Earth’s crust. 

Reuters
China is at least 30 years away from becoming a manufacturing nation of “great power,” a former industry minister said on Sunday, despite boasting the world’s most complete industrial supply chains. In recent years, China has become the world’s top manufacturing nation, accounting for over a third of global output, driven by domestic demand to produce everything from motor vehicles to industrial machinery. But its industries’ heavy dependence on U.S. high-tech products such as semiconductors constitute a strategic weakness.

Today’s Motor Vehicles
Halter CNC Robotics will be awarding a $2,500 scholarship to a U.S. veteran or active service member who wants to study manufacturing automation, engineering or robotics. The company believes it is important for American businesses to support skills training for our military and former members of the U.S. military. The goal of the scholarship is to bring awareness for more military members and veterans to find fulfilling careers in manufacturing automation and robotics.

Thomas Net
Does anyone else have a feeling that electric vehicles will boom in 2021? Even thought the market share of plug-in electric vehicles is still hovering at around 2%, all the pieces seem to be falling into place: Tesla is skyrocketing, the national EV charging network is growing rapidly, prices are coming down, and we’re even getting EV ads at the Superbowl.

Boeing Australia and the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) have successfully completed the first test flight of the Loyal Wingman uncrewed aircraft. The flight of the first military aircraft to be designed and manufactured in Australia in more than 50 years flew under the supervision of a Boeing test pilot monitoring the aircraft from a ground control station at the Woomera Range Complex. 

TCT Magazine
Renishaw has been put up for sale after founders Sir David McMurtry and John Deer outlined their intentions to sell their shareholdings. The pair, who founded the company in 1973 are now in their 80s, own approximately 53% of the issued share capital at Renishaw.

Press Release
Perceptron, Inc., a leading global provider of 3D automated metrology solutions and coordinate measuring machines, today announced that Mr. Anders Hoberg accepted the appointment for the position of Chief Executive Officer at Perceptron.

Manufacturing.net
Hyundai recently announced a recall of 82,000 vehicles which, in the world of auto recalls, is pretty small potatoes. Consider that GM’s fourth-quarter and full-year results took a $1.1 billion hit from a recall involving seven million vehicles due to dangerous air bags. And yet, experts are saying Hyundai’s new recall will cost the automaker much more on a per-vehicle basis: one of the highest in history, in fact. And the big factor behind this expense is that this particular recall relates to certain electric models.

Modern Machine Shop
ABB Inc., has added the GoFa and Swifti cobots to its portfolio, offering easy-to-program automation for increased operational safety and efficiency. 

Manufacturing Global
This spring, the 36th America’s Cup is scheduled to showcase the space-age, super-fast AC75 mono-hull yacht. In trials, digital twin technology was used by one team to emulate the performance of sailors in a new AC75 boat; a feat that radially accelerated prototype development compared with previous testing methods.

The Associated Press
The first commercial-scale offshore wind power development in U.S. history is edging closer to approval, federal officials said Monday. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management made the announcement about Vineyard Wind, a much anticipated and debated project off Massachusetts that would include dozens of turbines and produce enough power for more than 400,000 homes. 

Science Daily
As light as possible and as strong as possible at the same time. These are the requirements for modern lightweight materials, such as those used in aircraft construction and the automotive industry. A research team has now developed a new materials' design approach for future ultralight materials: Nanometer-sized metal struts that form nested networks on separate hierarchical levels provide amazing strength.

Aerospace Manufacturing and Design
Auburn Bearing & Manufacturing Inc., an American-based designer and manufacturer of thrust bearings, custom bearings and precision components, has acquired the assets of Aurotek TSB Inc. Aurotek TSB specializes in the production of precision thin-section bearings for a broad array of industries.