Trade show floor with 5 for Friday and IFPE 2023 logos

5 for Friday: A Fluid Situation, an Electric Time as IFPE Begins

March 10, 2023

Machine Design takes a look at the past week, and a look ahead to the issues facing the design and manufacturing sector.

Bob Vavra

1. Fluid Power Goes With the Flow

The evolving fluid power industry will gather in full force for the first time in six years next week for the triennial International Fluid Power Exposition in Las Vegas. The 2020 event came just at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, and many major fluid power exhibitors either cancelled or dramatically scaled back their involvement at the show. In the intervening three years, the nature of hydraulics and pneumatics also have changed, with electric power becoming a greater factor for both efficiency and sustainability.

This year’s IFPE will feature both new applications of fluid power and power transmission and new products designed to improve operations and deliver on the value of smart manufacturing throughout the manufacturing plant.

I’ll be reporting from the IFPE show floor as well as the CONEXPO Construction Equipment Show, which has been the segment to most quickly embrace not just fluid power’s evolution but also the growth of electric vehicles in heavy-duty uses.

2. The Duality of International Women’s Day

It is a measure of how far we’ve come that International Women’s Day, which was commemorated on Wednesday, received such widespread attention and acclaim. It is a measure of how far we still need to go in equality that International Women’s Day still needs widespread attention and acclaim.

Editor-in-Chief Rehana Begg interviewed Iana Aranda, director of engineering global development at the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), to discuss her efforts in working toward a more sustainable and more diverse manufacturing world.

3. Is Grease the Word?

In the world of gears, the issue of lubrication always is in consideration. Over time, as a recent Machine Design archived article reminded us, the evolution from petroleum-based lubricants to synthetics, and from cast-iron gears to plastics, have changed the strategy around keeping gears moving smoothly.

4. How Intelligent are you About AI?

Our colleagues at IndustryWeek are currently surveying industry leaders about their comfort levels and adoption of artificial intelligence. As the survey notes in its introduction, “In the manufacturing world, AI is more of the present than the future with many companies using predictive maintenance systems on machine tools, machine learning algorithms to check quality and demand forecasting systems to set work orders.” To participate in the IW survey, click here.

5. Engineering Academy Kicks off March 23

We’re less than two weeks away from Engineering Academy’s look at Design For Manufacturing and Assembly (DFMA), featuring presentations on the how to get started with DFMA, how to integrate humans and technology in the workforce, starting from scratch with smart manufacturing and using DFMA on machine frames. The sessions are free to all registrants, and you can sign up for this event by clicking here.