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moldmakingtechnology.com 31 helps disparate parts of the shop to act in concert. Since 2010, the shop's average on-time delivery rate has improved from less than 80 percent to 97.8 percent, and its quote-capture rate has more than doubled, Bartz says. A Culture of Perfection Finding focus hasn't changed the essentials of how work flows through the shop. Granted, the technology on the 12,000-square- foot floor is always in flux—the past year alone has seen the addition of more than $1.1 million worth of new equipment— but the basic foundations of the process were laid in the 1980s, Bartz says. That's when Mold Craft purchased its first stan- dardized workholding fixtures to move electrodes from mill to sinker without re-indicating. In 2007, the shop installed its first robot to save time and money for customers. Today, three robots feed not just electrodes, but cores, cavities and inserts as well, often on an as-needed basis within in the same cell. However, the shop discovered early on that technology alone wouldn't be enough to bring it into the future. The true differentiator is the people behind it, Bartz says, and their roles had to change. Robots and standardized workholding don't work well with variation, so executive decisions about how to machine a critical feature or set up a workpiece could no longer be left to a single toolmaker. In short, much of the "craft" at Mold Craft has moved to the front end, where designers engineer every fit and clearance between com- ponents to ensure true interchangeability. By the year 2000, "working layouts" had been replaced by fully detailed and tol- erance prints for every unique item in a mold. Once the prints arrive on the floor, operators follow the predetermined manu- facturing process to the letter. Bartz says this automation- centric production strategy enables Mold Craft to regularly achieve tolerances as tight as ±0.0001 inch without spotting. (In fact, the shop doesn't even own a spotting press.) Developing a detailed process in advance to ensure jobs get done right the first time is ideal for high-end tooling involv- Nothing happens on the shop foor without fully annotated and toleranced drawings (inset) that guide workers in following predetermined manufacturing processes to the letter. That way, all components on molds like this one ft together correctly the frst time without spotting or other secondary work.