Boeing is Awarded a $35 Billion Contract

After a decade of delays, Pentagon awarded one of the biggest defense contracts ever to build airborne refueling tankers (flying gas stations) - to Boeing Company. These new airplanes will replace their peers from 1950s. Boeing will base the tanker on its 767 aircraft. The contract will mean 50,000 jobs.

Boeing Defeats EADS for $35 Billion Air Force Tanker Program - Businessweek

Machine Tool Sales (finally) Back to Normal

Statistics from 2010 looks promising. Manufacturing industry is finally back on track and companies have started to make investment.
Machine Tool Sales Return to “Normal” – Up 75% in December

Volume Based Feed Rate Optimization: Can We Rely On It?

Feed rate optimization of NC programs has started to become a hot topic for the past 5 years. Most CAM companies have developed some type of an optimization tool to adjust feed rate along the tool path. The idea behind feed rate manipulation is to dynamically change feed rate along tool paths where geometry varies. This way, a long G01 command with one feed value can be split into a number of shorter G01 commands with different feed rate. The fundamental assumption that such systems are based on, called Volume Based Optimization, is that 

Process outputs such as spindle power/torque, cutting forces, tool deflection, etc... are directly proportional to the material removal rate (or the volume of material removed)... 

Since CAM based systems only have the geometric information obtained from tool path simulation and workpiece geometry update, this assumption seemed valid at the time. However, researchers specialized in metal cutting prove this assumption wrong! It is very likely that two different cutting configurations with identical material removal rate may result 50%-100% difference in peak cutting forces, spindle power/torque, etc...