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Training/Education 44 MoldMaking Technology —— AUGUST 2016 such as the Bridgeport milling machine or LeBlonde manual lathes with digital readouts. Students are required to complete two projects in this class, using the conventional equipment to machine aluminum workpieces and hone basic turning, facing and knurling skills used in metalworking. After those project pieces are completed on the conventional equipment, the designs are converted so that the students can use the more advanced CNC equipment and software to make the same parts. They begin with MDI programming on the Haas VMC, which features the company's Intuitive Programming System (IPS), a graphics interface on the controllers. This enables the students to input parameters that the machines trans- late into G code. From the IPS, the students progress into learning more advanced subjects, including Mastercam X9 programming, as well as threading, contour milling, dynamic high-speed pocket milling, thread milling and engraving. LEARN MORE Filling the Skills Gap in Advanced Manufacturing Read up on the many schools, organizations and companies that are finding ways to recruit and train talented young people for careers in advanced manufacturing at short.moldmakingtechnology.com/ skillsgap . Using the Cougar-built injection molding machine, one student created a replica of a 120-year-old clock tower on the WSU campus. End mills as small as 0.020 inch in diameter and a variety of surface-machining and high-speed pocketing techniques were used to create the detailed mold. They finish out the course by using Mastercam and the more advanced machines to further customize the two parts they manufactured on the conventional equipment. "The best part of my job is when I see the connections being made between the students and the machine tools as they watch their parts being made," Hutchinson says. Adding Moldmaking to the Mix In 2014, Hutchinson and three student assistants took a class on moldmaking at CNC Software's Gig Harbor, Washington, facility, where the company offers instructor training during the summer. Hutchinson notes proudly that his students were the fastest finishers of the course project. The group incorporated what they learned into the project- based curriculum for their ME 475 class, which Hutchinson calls an "enterprise engineering" class, because it focuses on systems design, manufacturing processes and programming for manufacturing. He and his student assistants proceeded to build their own small injection molding machine, using pneumatic cylinders Hutchinson had at the shop, along with a Bosch frame that was fitted with aluminum to form its exte- rior and with hardened steel for the main chamber. They also used scrap brass material to build the nozzle and employed an old milling machine vise for workholding. Hutchinson says the machine, which is about 24 inches wide and 18 inches tall, looks like it was invented by cartoonist Rube Goldberg, "but it works great!" The class primarily has used sty- rene for injection molding, but he says high-density polyeth- ylene (HDPE) and other polyethylene materials also work well in it, and the students have experimented with other materials as well. They also have tested different coatings, temperatures and other factors to learn more about molding in general. Although the simple injection machine's size and volumet- ric capacity limits molding to either very small parts or larger parts in multiple pieces, all the students were able to design and build their own single-cavity aluminum molds and then mold their own parts. Each student was given a set of aluminum soft jaws out of a 6-inch vise to serve as the A and B halves of their molds. They used end mills as small as 0.020 inch and a variety of surface-machining and high-speed pocketing techniques to machine molds for parts that included a mouthpiece for a trum- pet and a replica of a clock tower on the WSU campus. Building the injection molding machine also gave the