It’s Monday morning, December 15, 2036. An autonomous vehicle drops off two engineers in front of a gear manufacturing facility in Metro Detroit. They punch in for work on their wristwatches and pay Uber for the ride on a smartphone. One of the engineers begins walking the shop floor, monitoring a series of collaborative robots using a tablet the size of a paperback novel. These robots interact right on the floor with the minimal staff scheduled to oversee manufacturing operations. Another engineer wears an interactive headset and begins training a group of new engineers (in real time) from China using some form of augmented reality.
Matthew Jaster of Gear Technology magazine recently wrote, “Gear Shop of Tomorrow,” an article summarizing several visions of the future of gear manufacturing from industry professionals. Adam Gimpert, Business Manager of Koepfer America, was included, speaking about the increased velocity of gear conception-to-reality.
The article “Gear Shop of Tomorrow” (Gear Technology, November/December 2016) should appear in the box below, but if you do not see it, you can download it here or visit Gear Technology’s webpage.