Almost everyone who visits TNT EDM, a job shop in Plymouth, Michigan, remarks about its unusual decor. With natural wood trim around the doorways, polished granite flooring in hallways, concealed lighting and wainscoted walls, this 40-person shop has the ambience of an office suite for a brokerage firm or design studio. Yet the 60,000-square feet of manufacturing space at TNT is home to more than four dozen EDM (electrical discharge machining) units, both wire and CNC sinker, and an almost equal number of CNC milling machines and machining centers. The "professional" atmosphere created by the decor simply reflects the shop's serious devotion to high quality, high precision machining. TNT's newest automated machining cells typify this distinctive combination of advanced technology and artful style. All seven of these cells consist of two machine tools served by a single robot and carrousel. Three of the cells are for CNC sinker EDM; two are for wire EDM; and two are for milling graphite electrodes. At first glance, the arrangement of these cells seems very typical of many roboticized cells installed in shops around the country since the 1990s, especially in progressive mold shops.
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