Twenty-five years ago this month in Machinery - February 1988

The change follows the publication of a White Paper and Machinery mulls over the proposed principal changes of emphasis. Point one, we say, must be the resolve of the new department to bring business into education and to encourage education to consider the needs of business. There is in the White Paper a proposal that every year 10% of teachers should have the opportunity to gain personal business experience. Point two is a fundamental shift in the use of taxpayers' money; moving away from large companies to small ones (fewer than 25 people), and in support of users of high tech equipment, rather than the suppliers of such. A major drive for smaller firms to make use of consultants, particularly in management skills, is another element, with £250 million on offer between 1988 and 1991. Machinery concludes that the government has "taken a major step along the road of reducing interventionism"; changing from "propping up businesses" to "selectively encouraging" them. In the news pages, the government is encouraging companies to take up advanced manufacturing technology (AMT), via its 'Inside UK Manufacturing' initiative. The scheme offers access to 100 companies already employing AMT, which takes in: flexible manufacturing systems and cells; CNC machining; automated assembly; lasers; CADCAM; just-in-time principles; plus materials requirements planning (MRP). Looking ahead to the year's MACH exhibition, a biennial event which continues today, and its organiser, the Machine Tool Trades Association (MTTA – now the Manufacturing Technologies Association, MTA) is heralding a demonstration of the Manufacturing Automation Protocol (MAP), a standard to support the connection of shopfloor equipment to better allow communication and automation. Driven by America's GE, this was a big technological push of the day, with government money also behind its promotion. It was, however, outpaced by standardisation of communications in general. Also in the news pages, we report that Desktop Engineering Systems is offering an Apple Macintosh-based CADCAM system for under £10,000, with it demonstrated at the Which Computer show driving a Matchmaker VMC. Staying with computer technology, and British CNC firm RDP had struck a deal with a Yugoslav company, 9,000-employee Ivo Lola Ribar of Belgrade (now in Serbia). The link was to see the launch of a standard controller for machine tools, robots and industrial automation, based on RDP technology. Ivo Lola Ribar had ambitions to be a major FMS supplier to Eastern Europe. News of a buyer-subcontractor matching service to link buyers with subcontractors able to offer the required service also surfaced. A paid-for facility, it followed another similar initiative launched in 1985, but since closed, we noted. Twenty subcontractors had signed up to the £2,000 service, we reported, but the number of buyers, who paid just £100/year, was not revealed. In one of this month's features, Machinery visits the UK's first subcontractor to employ the orbital forging technique. Floform (now part of Dawson Shanahan since 2009 – see http://is.gd/835dBm) in Welshpool had invested £300,000 in a Switzerland-made 200 ton Schmid T 200 machine, with this having a capability equivalent to a 1,500 to 2,000 tonne press of conventional design, it was stated. Another benefit of the process was lower tooling costs that made annual runs of 10,000 economical. In another feature, Neill Tools (a brand of Spear & Jackson PLC since 1995) had installed five of UK machine tool company Beaver Machine Tools' horizontal machining centres, complemented by robot-automated heat treatment, at its Sheffield factory. They were put to work making plier parts. The investment was part of a broader modernisation programme by the company. Events this month: [] Heike Dreschler (East Germany), indoor long jump world record (7.37 m) [] British actor Dudley Moore marries actress Brogan Lane [] Microsoft Windows 2 is the modern computer interface (launched December 1987) [] £50 in 1988 was equivalent to £100 in 2011 [] Eddie the Eagle (pictured) soars to fame at the Winter Olympics in Calgary First published in Machinery, February 2013