Chapter 2
Demystifying Machine Tools
IN THIS CHAPTER
Taking control: From paper tape to CNC
Milling about with machining centers
Turning the corner with lathes
Multitasking is a good thing
If we want to reduce poverty and misery, if we want to give to every deserving individual what is needed for a safe existence of an intelligent being, we want to provide more machinery, more power. Power is our mainstay, the primary source of our many-sided energies.
—NIKOLA TESLA
If you read the preceding chapter, you now know everything — well, almost everything — there is to know about the history of machine tools. And unless you’re already a mechanical engineer or experienced machinist, you also have a far greater understanding of gears, pulleys, drive systems, and the other devices needed to make machine tools do what they do. Pretty neat stuff, huh?
If you didn’t read it, that’s okay. You don’t need to know who invented the television to enjoy Saturday night Seinfeld reruns (it was Philo T. Farnsworth, in 1927) or how they work (tube-style televisions contained electron guns, which today ...
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