Founded in 1997 and headquartered in Wichita, Kansas, Thayer Aerospace is a leading manufacturer of complex structural components and assemblies for the commercial aerospace, defense and space industries.

Company President Bill Remy explains that because of the cost competitive nature of a contract with Vought Aircraft Industries, Thayer needed to invest in high-speed machining.

"High-speed machining gives you a big competitive advantage and a cost advantage that you can't match with conventional machines," Remy says. "For machining aluminum aircraft components, high-speed machining is the only way to compete. It is the only way shops can remain competitive down the road."

Thayer turned to Makino. They brought in a Makino A77E horizontal machine center to train their professional machinists on high-speed machining, then added three A55Es and an A88E Makino machines to exclusively machine 737 structural parts. They later added a Makino Machining Complex with the Model B2 Software Cell Controller to the A55E bank of machines to allow them to run unattended.

With the Makino high-speed machines on board, Thayer has seen its entire operations improve significantly in refining product quality, reducing waste and decreasing inventory levels. They have also been able to streamline inventory into a "just-in-time" model. In addition, Thayer has been able to dramatically cut back on its production process because of their accuracy and repeatability.

"The Makino machines have taken away set-ups, they have reduced time and costs and we're able to complete the process in one step. This has helped us drive substantial costs out of our operation," Remy says. A part that now takes three hours to make would have been substantially increased with previous machinery. "Without Makino technology on the A77E and A88E, that would have taken much longer because we would have had to set that up and run it through a conventional machining process. This way, we were able to work with our customers to solve the issue and end up with a much improved product."

"We attribute a tremendous amount of our success to adding the Makino machines," Remy says. "They have taken us to a different level than we were at three years ago. We are now able to think about doing new work with new methods every time we see a package to quote."

"We've acquired a tremendous amount of knowledge in terms of how hard we can push through the material," he says. "With the harmonic balancing and optimization, we've learned what styles of cutter work best. With machine rigidity, vibration control and dampening features and the vibration monitoring software, Makino machines have allowed us to become more efficient. They have helped ensure quality operations and have eliminated a significant amount of waste."

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