And this isn’t going to change overnight. You know what I’m talking about.
Most of the good machinist knowledge in America has retired, if not already literally died.
And mechanical engineers in the US largely don’t have the hands on skill to really understand making these machines. Not that that can’t gain it.
But to achieve truly high precision (the pinnacle from which all other percussion is derived) is an extreme art form. CNC doesn’t come close. The state of the art (and has been for eons) is hand scraping: https://www.krcmachinetoolsolutions.com/machine-tool-scrapin...
Things used to be made better because people cared about making a good product and took pride in their work. This is especially true in the machine tool industry: don’t try to make it in the field if you don’t really legitimately care.
> The state of the art (and has been for eons) is hand scraping
No, it absolutely is not. Optics machine tools make things flat and accurate within a few atoms. Cheap surface plates are more precise than any human could hope to achieve by hand.
Hand scraping is remarkable- skill can get you ~micron cutting depth. It would be totally obsolete except that the rough crosshatch pattern it creates is useful for retaining oil. Modern tools, especially the most precise tools, are not hand scraped. Cheap clone knee mills are hand scraped. Single-point diamond cutters run on air bearings with no oil, because the oil gap in plain ways is too large.
Hand scraping is thoroughly limited by the viscosity of the marking fluid. You identify high spots by painting a flat blue and rubbing it on another flat part. If the whole surface rubs off then you can't tell where to scrape. The fluid does not spread out in single atom thickness.
Most of the good machinist knowledge in America has retired, if not already literally died.
And mechanical engineers in the US largely don’t have the hands on skill to really understand making these machines. Not that that can’t gain it.
But to achieve truly high precision (the pinnacle from which all other percussion is derived) is an extreme art form. CNC doesn’t come close. The state of the art (and has been for eons) is hand scraping: https://www.krcmachinetoolsolutions.com/machine-tool-scrapin...
Things used to be made better because people cared about making a good product and took pride in their work. This is especially true in the machine tool industry: don’t try to make it in the field if you don’t really legitimately care.