AGMA Gear Industry News

Output at U.S. manufacturers rose in February for a sixth consecutive month, underscoring a sustained rebound in the industry. The 0.5 percent gain at factories, which make up 75 percent of overall industrial output, matched the prior month’s advance, marking the best back-to-back performance in three years, a Federal Reserve report showed Friday. Total industrial production, which includes mines and utilities, was unchanged as warm weather reduced demand for heating.

If anyone is looking for further signs that the U.S. economy appears to be turning a corner, look no further than the fact that many of the indicators released last week hit multiyear highs. In addition, the Federal Reserve has sent a strong signal that it sees accelerating growth in the economy. Of course, future Federal Reserve moves will hinge on incoming data, and more aggressive action might be necessary if the U.S. economy and/or inflation accelerate beyond current expectations.

This course focuses the supporting elements of a gearbox that allow gears and bearings to do their jobs most efficiently. Learn about seals, lubrication, lubricants, housings, breathers and other details that go into designing gearbox systems. 

(Video) The Manufacturers Resource Center of Allentown hosted a "What’s so cool about manufacturing?" video contest for area schools. 

Toyota is to invest £240m in upgrading its UK factory that makes the Auris and Avensis models. The Japanese carmaker's investment in the Burnaston plant near Derby will allow production of vehicles using its new global manufacturing system.

The factory employs about 2,500 people, while another 590 work at Toyota's engine plant at Deeside, North Wales.

2016 was a good year for manufacturing leadership: Job satisfaction was up and so was pay. Medical device manufacturing took the lead in salaries, while the most lucrative job was vice president of manufacturing and production.

Six months ago, David met Goliath. Six months later, Goliath is getting carried away on his shield. This contest began last August, with tiny SpaceX going up against United Launch Alliance, the giant space venture jointly operated by Boeing and Lockheed Martin, in a critical contest to see who would launch the U.S. Air Force's next "GPS III" satellite.

Gain a solid and fundamental understanding of gear geometry, types and arrangements, and design principles. Starting with the basic definitions of gears, conjugate motion, and the Laws of Gearing, learn the tools needed to understand the inter‐relation and coordinated motion operating within gear pairs and multi‐gear trains. Basic gear system design process and gear measurement and inspection techniques will also be explained. In addition, the fundamentals of understanding the step‐wise process of working through the iterative design process required to generate a gear pair will be reviewed. Learn the steps and issues involved in design refinement and some manufacturing considerations. An explanation of basic gear measurement techniques, how measurement equipment and test machines implement these techniques, and how to interpret the results from these basic measurements will also be covered.

The issue of sustainability has never been more prominent. Around the world, headlines are full of warnings on the dangers of climate change as companies, people and governments campaign for greener policies and practices. One of the sectors most affected by this drive is chemical processing and manufacturing.

Japanese manufacturer NTN Corp. on Friday announced that its Indiana-based joint venture plans to build a second auto parts factory and add about 200 jobs in coming years. NTK Precision Axle Corp. — a venture between NTN, Takao Kogyo and Neturen — makes driveshaft components in Anderson, Ind.; its second plant will make turning and heat treatment processes and increase the business' overall production capacity.

A challenge every professional within the manufacturing industry faces is market fragmentation. With so many players crowding the space, there is no single company that owns a large enough share to be able to influence the industry's collective direction. Combine this obstacle with the increasing cost of sales, low switching costs and evolving sales channels, and the result is that the sector’s already thin margins continue to shrink.

(Video) The Internet of Things gives us access to the data from millions of devices. But how does it work?

The civil aviation industry is one of the most asset-intensive industries in the world. With parts that are high-cost and low in numbers, even the slightest of improvements in asset functionality and maintenance can yield significant cost and efficiency advantages.

A promise to bring back manufacturing jobs to the U.S. was the mainstay of President Trump’s campaign in 2016. The delivery of this promise was largely based on a strategy of renegotiating trade agreements with countries like Mexico, China and so on. As a result, President Trump signed an executive order to pull out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), and his administration is currently working on amendments to the NAFTA agreement.

Volvo Trucks — a company completely independent of Volvo Cars — has introduced an experimental heavy-duty truck powered by a hybrid drivetrain. The prototype showcases realistic, close-to-production ways to begin weening the long-haul transport industry off of fossil fuels.

(Video) Jerry Chen, a partner at Greylock Partners, discusses the future of U.S. infrastructure with Bloomberg's Caroline Hyde on "Bloomberg Technology." 

Recently I visited Fiat Chrysler’s Mound Road Engine Plant (Detroit) to learn about improvements that have been made to the Pentastar V6 that is built there. The engine first was introduced in 2011. It was designed starting with a clean sheet of paper, so it is somewhat surprising that only six years later it is receiving numerous modifications.

In preparation for mass customization, for starters, Japanese and German tech research officials today committed to expanding their joint work to establish a "social-technical or maybe ‘cyber-social’ environment where ‘digital companions’ and production lines communicate with humans" working in manufacturing, Andreas Dengel said in an interview with Smart Manufacturing magazine.

AGMA members are provided the opportunity twice per year to attend Marketing & Forecasting conferences. At these events, AGMA enlists the support of experts in the industry to provide statistical reports, presentations, and analysis on the current gear market conditions and future forecasts. The focus of this event is the Gear Market Report, produced by IHS Global Insight, provides information on the U.S. Economic conditions, industry conditions for gears, gear market bookings, and gear market shipments. The report and presentation at the conference will also break down the statistics into a series of end user markets.