Why Our Office Nameplates Are Over-Engineered (And Why We Love Them)

Why Our Office Nameplates Are Over-Engineered (And Why We Love Them)

Growth usually means moving desks and adding chairs, but at Texas Metal Works, we saw our recent office shuffle as a creative opportunity. As our team expanded, we found ourselves in need of a more dynamic nameplate design, and I wasn’t going to miss a chance to flex my graphic design and branding muscles. I…

SolidWorks’ Poor UI Is Keeping This Useful Checkbox From You
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SolidWorks’ Poor UI Is Keeping This Useful Checkbox From You

We’ve all had that losing “staring contest” with the loading bar in SolidWorks. You’re working on something relatively simple. You’ve got a grid of holes or slots to pattern in your model. It isn’t really rocket science, but SolidWorks is treating it like it is calculating the landing trajectory for a Mars landing. You save…

A close up view of a welding table is shown emphasizing etch lines on it.
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Value Engineering a Flagship Product Line: How to Save Time and Money

If your job is closely associated with product development, you’ve probably heard the term value engineering. I’ve had the opportunity to value engineer two flagship product lines in my career. These projects remain on my list of top 10 projects because of the impact they had on cost and time savings at both companies. For…

How to optimize laser efficiency by rounding sharp corners.
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How to optimize laser efficiency by rounding sharp corners.

If your workplace cuts sheet metal using a fiber laser or CNC plasma cutter, you know that time is literally money. Cutting faster means producing faster, and improving efficiency out of a shift. Most companies focus on operational improvements: reducing loading/unloading time, optimizing cut conditions, streamlining workflows, etc. But one often overlooked aspect is part…