Machine Building

I build one-off machines for problems a catalogue vendor can’t help with. Custom fixtures, shop tooling, automation cells, retrofits of old industrial machinery, and the occasional thing nobody else makes anymore.

The work spans every step from a sketch on the back of an envelope through CAD, fabrication, machining, and commissioning. That matters because most “machine builds” stall at the boundaries between disciplines — the designer hands a drawing to the welder who hands a weldment to the machinist who hands it back to someone trying to figure out why the geometry doesn’t close. Doing all of it in one shop, by one person, removes those boundaries.

What this looks like in practice

• One-off production tooling. Slip rollers, press brakes, welding positioners, fixture tables — the bench equipment a small shop needs but can’t justify buying off the shelf.
• Retrofit and rebuild. Bringing old industrial iron back into service with modern controls, replacement parts, and reground geometry.
• Automation cells and robot integration. Sticking a manipulator next to a process and writing the glue that makes them talk.
• Repair of things nobody makes any more. The handwheel for a fifty-year-old lathe, the axle for a vintage scope, the bracket that was never ordered as a spare.

Adjacent doors

If your project is a connected product — mechanism plus electronics plus a phone app or a web UI — the hardware-plus-software door is the better fit; it’s the same shop, leaning harder on the integration seams. If you need pure software work, see software engineering.