Full speed ahead in spite of stormy worldwide economic conditions
2019 was anything but an easy year for many. High trade tensions aggravated an ongoing cyclical showdown in global economic activity. Given inconclusive trade negotiations, repercussions from the possible withdrawal of Britain from the European Union, plus the election fervor in the United States, 2020 looks like an equally problematic year.
Meister Abrasives has sales offices strategically located worldwide. Its unique abrasive products are made in only three locations – Switzerland, Germany, and the United States. Meister Abrasives USA, Inc. is the production, marketing, and sales resource for North America.
Against the noted difficult economic conditions, Meister Abrasives turned in another significant year of development and achievement. Some of our traditional markets, especially automotive, felt those financial headwinds. However, Meister’s corporate commitment to being first out with innovative new grinding products allowed Meister Abrasives USA to make inroads into some new, highly desirable markets while maintaining our position in other traditional ones.
Here’s a brief rundown on our past year’s accomplishments:
Major Inroads in Semiconductor and Aerospace Opportunities
A critical requirement…in both semiconductor and other grinding applications where extremely hard materials are in use, is to establish extraordinarily tight tolerances. Having designated the semiconductor business as a key objective moving forward, Meister Abrasives corporate has spent years experimenting with combinations of diamond configurations and ultra porous structures.
In May we reported on Switzerland’s new white room. This state of the art lab prevents cross contamination of micron and sub micron size abrasive crystals during the manufacturing of ultra-fine vitrified grinding wheels for custom-tailored semiconductor manufacturing plus other industries where hard surfaces are present. Aerospace is an excellent example for us here in the US. In HVOF grinding, for example, we’ve been able to yield 30-50% cycle time improvements vs. resin-bonded wheels. Here’s our Flying High case history.
You Want to do What?
Several years ago Meister revolutionized the dressing market with its micro-precision CNC dressing tools capable of grinding applications with form tolerances down to 2µm. This year Meister did it again…with its groundbreaking cDD single-point stationary dressers.
Until now traditional hand-set natural diamond dressers exhibited performance-altering wear in as few as 100 or 200 dressing cycles. Meister’s new cDD tools maintain dressing sharpness throughout thousands of dressing cycles. And, since cost was an issue, even though the benefits far outweighed the expense, we chose to address the issue head-on with the help of a very dubious production manager (pictured above). The story has led to a significant uptick in the sale of this new product as well as our complete dressing line.
To meet the growing demand for dressing tools, Meister Switzerland nearly doubled its manufacturing capabilities for dressing products in 2019, and we now carry significant stock of standard shapes and sizes for both rotary and stationary tools.
Big wheels are Rolling Even Faster!
It was only four years ago that Meister-USA expanded its large diameter wheel manufacturing capacities with processes, materials and equipment mirroring those used by Meister Switzerland. Since then our large wheel US business has grown very nicely. This past year we added a new press and trimming machine to nearly double our capacity. Switzerland, too, invested heavily into this area, with additional equipment and machines, including a full-size test bed for double-side fine grinding wheels to perform in-house customer trials before committing to full production.
The Reviews are In
In January of 2019 we unveiled a retooled and enhanced Meister Toolbox. The bold graphics, new key page designations, dual searching systems and state of the art navigation have proven to be a hit. More and more grinding folks are logging on and returning frequently to benefit from the continually posted flow of information. Subscribers to the site receive email alerts whenever new information is posted…and at least every two months. If you aren’t a subscriber, you can sign up for our mailing list here.
Coming Around Again
This is the year for both GrindTec and IMTS. And Meister has great plans…and a few surprises…in store. For instance a remarkable bore grinding break through for fuel injectors and new products to improve and simplify semiconductor boule grinding. GrindTec, being primarily European, is a Meister Switzerland show, and IMTS will be hosted by Meister USA.
At the shows in 2018 we asked you to bring us your problems and goals you wanted to reach. We had our team of Applications Engineers on hand to listen and offer solutions. Not sales pitches; After all, that’s really what differentiates Meister from the competition. We’re problem solvers. Stay tuned for more show details in the coming months.
