LittleMachineShop.com

A Darn Big Trade Show

2011-04-20T14:06:00.001-07:00

I can’t find anything that says the Canton Fair is the largest trade show in the world, but I suspect it is, at least by some measure. It’s far larger than any other I’ve attended, and I’ve been to at least a few large ones (remember Comdex?).

The Canton Fair, officially called the China Import and Export Fair is held at the China Foreign Trade Centre. This complex is over 1/2 mile long and comprises 16 halls, most of which contain multiple floors (up to 4).

A snapshot can’t start to show the scale of this place because it can only show a small percentage of the buildings.

This walkway is between two sections of the facility. It’s at least a quarter mile long, but is only abut half as long as the main walkway down the center of the building.

Because of a lack of space, the fair must be held in three phases, with the product categories split between phases. Each phase is 5 days long with a three day break between to change exhibits to the different product categories. Following are the product categories. Note that they are not too restrictive.

Phase 1

Electronics & Household Electrical Appliances
Lighting Equipment
Vehicles & Spare Parts
Machinery
Hardware & Tools
Building Materials
Chemical Products

Phase 2

Consumer Goods
Gifts
Home Decorations

Phase 3

Textiles & Garments
Shoes
Office Supplies, Cases & Bags, and Recreation Products
Medicines, Medical Devices and Health Products
Food

What’s to see?

Here is a view of one of the halls from one level up.

Note the product category is ‘large machinery’. Not ‘metalworking machinery’, or such like. That’s a pretty broad category and that is born out by the types of machinery on exhibition.

Need to make rope? That’s an interesting machine.

Fill a bottle? There were all manner of package making and filling machines.

Make Oreos? This machine adds the crème filling between the two cookies.

Make concrete. Some vendors used models, but the real thing is outside.

Yes, there were metalworking machines too,

Plus food mixers and press brakes.

And diaper-making machines.

In summary, everything you can imagine. And this is in just one hall.

There were the usual Chinese safety guards. The plastic shield around the sides of this red hot induction heated steel rod provides plenty of protection.

And it’s only needed because the whole display is in the isle of the trade show. Look mom, what a pretty red…

And the usual great slogans.

SIEG had a booth there.

One of the amazing things about large gatherings of people in China is the lack of waiting in lines. We registered for the show in about 10 minutes, including meeting with three different departments because they couldn’t figure out what to do with us.

I’m guessing there were 150,000 attendees there, yet we waited abut two minutes for lunch in the largest food court I have ever seen. It’s about the size of a football field. This photo is taken from the center of the room. There are at least two McDonalds in this exhibition complex.

We worked pretty hard to get through the sections we need to see, which were large machinery, small machinery, and tools. We only had a little time for the fun stuff like consumer electronics, motorcycles, construction equipment, and computers.

Weight lifting equipment

In-line skateboards.

You can’t just put the babies in the bicycle basket…

A pink scooter anyone? ((We saw one of these on the street in Shanghai)

Just writing this makes my feet sore. We figured we put in over 10 miles a day. That’s enough.

How Do You Make a Gage Block?

2011-04-18T08:56:00.001-07:00

Yesterday we visited a gage block factory. Making gage bocks is an interesting process. This factory can make about 1000 blocks a day.

Gage blocks come in several grades. The most common is a grade for use in the shop called AS-2. These are typically within 25 millionths of an inch of the size marked.

Better gage blocks are grade AS-1. These are within +8 and –4 millionths of an inch. And grade 0 gage blocks are within +4 and –2 millionths of an inch of the marked size.

Here’s how they are made. They start with the raw material that is sawed to size. The steel is a special grade called “Gage Block material”.

The first step is surface grinding. This gets them to the rough size. It probably finishes the non-working surfaces.

Next is rough lapping. These machines work on a lot of gage blocks at a time. The rough lapping machines are in the machine shop.

Here is what that machine looks when it is open. The gage blocks go on the silver doughnut.

These intermediate lapping machines are in more of a lab environment. They are getting the gage blocks closer to size.

At this point the gage blocks are laser marked with their size. They also get a serial number. The bright dot near the right center is the laser at work.

Now the gage blocks move to final lapping. Each workbench has a lapping machine and a comparator. The gage blocks go back and forth between the lapping machine and the comparator several times.

Here is a lapping machine opened up. The gage blocks go in the rectangular holes in the yellowish disk.

The operators spend most of their time measuring.

Once finished, the gage blocks are given a final measurement.

This is where the various grades are separated. The measurements are recorded and the gage blocks separated by grade. The gage blocks that ‘make the grade’ are put in the grade 0 or grade AS-1 piles. Those that don’t go in the AS-2 pile.

The gage blocks are oil coated and wrapped. Ever notice how neat the wrapping is? She is doing a block about every two seconds.

Finally, the gage blocks are put in sets.

The plant is adding an inventory of pin gages. Just setting up the inventory is a daunting task. These women are sorting a shipment of pin gages. The will go on the blue shelves on the right.

Pin gages come in sizes from 0.011 to 0.500, by 0.001 inches. That’s 490 sizes. But you can get “minus” pin gages and “plus” pin gages, so that doubles the number to 980 sizes. Metric? That’s more sizes.

A Train Ride

2011-04-14T17:32:00.001-07:00

We rode the train from Beijing to Qingdao. That’s a distance of about 490 miles (790 Km). On the high speed train it takes 5 hours and 45 minutes.

The first time I took this trip on a train it was an overnight sleeper that took over 12 hours.

The train is moderately high speed. Top speed I saw was 244 KPH, which is 152 MPH. We maintained this speed for the first couple hours, but then the speed was reduced as track conditions changed. The slowest sustained speed I saw was 164 KPH, or 100 MPH. The slower we went, the rougher the ride because of poorer track. At full speed the ride was very smooth. It was never a bad ride.

The Beijing South Railway Station is fairly new, and looks like an airport. It’s only for high speed trains. There are 24 tracks. A train leaves each track about every 15 minutes.

Leaving Beijing we passed a lot of factories…

and freeways.

Once clear of the city, we passed cities, villages, and farms. Never in the 490 miles did we see undeveloped land.

There’s lots of agriculture, but all that we saw was pretty small scale. Farms reaching to the horizon, but not fields reaching to the horizon. Most of the crops appeared to be vegetables, so huge fields are probably not appropriate. And the labor input is pretty high, as illustrated by this guy hand-watering.

Several areas were covered with greenhouses. These greenhouses don’t just stretch as far as you can see in the snapshot. They really do reach the horizon. I have no ideas how many acres are covered with these low greenhouses.

We saw many, many apartments under construction.

Never built one at a time, I’ve seen up to 35 buildings going up in a complex.

If you look between the buildings under construction in the photo below, you will see something that appears at any construction site-- worker housing. Its always blue and white, and always constructed out of sheet metal.

We think this is a fish farm. Couldn’t read the sign.

We saw plenty of older-style homes too. I say older-style because these appear to be brand new.

There is lots of industry. From small factories to large industrial complexes.

We saw coal trains…

coal yards…

and coal-burning power plants.

And many views of everyday life.

It was a very interesting trip, and a great way to see everyday life in China.

Manufacturing in Taiwan

2011-04-08T16:56:00.001-07:00

This will be my fifth trip to China. On each trip I visit manufacturing plants in various cities. On this trip we stopped in Taiwan on the way to China to visit a few plants.

The contrasts between Taiwanese and Chinese manufacturing plants are interesting. Taiwan has achieved a reputation as a place from which to get high quality yet affordable machine tools and accessories (as well as many other products). China has a reputation for inexpensive machine tool accessories (as well as many other products). So what makes the difference?

I’m sure it will come as no surprise that the difference can be summed up in three words—attention to detail. While this obviously covers manufacturing practices such as quality control at each manufacturing step. It is also reflected in things like plant cleanliness and working environment.

Let’s take a look at some of the things I noticed.

The first thing I noticed when I walked into one of these Taiwanese plants was the floor. It’s painted green, not covered by many years accumulation of grease. The workers are sitting on stools and working at a bench. They are not sitting on old crates and working on the floor. They have proper tools and proper containers for the work.

This woman is deburring her work pieces. The machine behind her is processing the next part so it doesn’t take any extra time. One of China’s big economic advantages is inexpensive labor. Why can’t they use just a little of that labor to debur a part once in a while?

We saw in-process QA after most production steps. They don’t wait to find problems in the completed product. Finding problems early has several advantages. The error is easier to correct if the product does not need to be disassembled to get to the issue. And the cause can be corrected more quickly if the problem is found early.

See the binder standing up in front of this woman applying labels to the product? She does not have to rely on memory to get the correct label in the correct spot. Process control ensures that products are made correctly, order after order.

And, of course, we saw excellent quality control. The two rows of tools are statistically correct samples from batches of finished products. The open binder shows production in what a correct product should look like. The sheet in the front is a detailed inspection report. One failure in a sample of this size means the entire lot will be checked one by one.

This entire blog is one big generality—Taiwan good, China bad. Don’t believe it for a moment. To say that all Chinese factories are poorly run is simply not true. There are all levels of production in China. Some products that we get from China are more precise than the “good old” American brand. And your iPad was not made in a factory with greasy floors. China is a huge place and you can get virtually anything made there to any quality standards.

The Shortest Day

2010-06-22T21:33:00.001-07:00

I’m able to post this blog myself because I am in the Seoul Airport in Korea. All of a sudden I can see and edit my blog. Technical difficulties in China, I guess.

I left Qingdao, China at 10:00 AM this morning. I will land in Los Angeles at 10:10 AM this morning. If all goes well.

Wish me luck. Home soon!

The Wedding

2010-06-22T21:25:00.001-07:00

On Sunday I attended a wedding in Qingdao. It was held at an upscale hotel and there were about 400 guests.

I apologize for the photos. Point and shoot camera, at long distance, and no flash.

We arrived right as the bride and groom did. To a drum corps of middle aged ladies. Very loud and energetic. This was in front of the hotel. The bride and groom entered the hotel and quickly disappeared.

In the hallway to the ballroom were three things.

The seating chart was on the wall about 10 feet wide. (I guess you gotta know where you are in the pecking order.)

A very good string quartet. Just as in Southern California, all the best young musicians are Chinese.

And the guest book. People sign their name quite large in the guest book. All Chinese but one.

The small red envelopes are for wedding gifts. All the same thing, just different denominations. Pretty practical. Kids get enough to get started in life.

The ballroom was done up pretty well.

There were just about 40 tables of 10 each.

Here’s a place setting. I still don’t know what’s in the favor package as I have to get it home to my wife and daughters while it is still intact.

Knowing the host of this party I was pretty sure we wouldn’t run short of food and drink. This is actually only the reserve stock. There were staging tables all around the room that were already provisioned.

All the guests took their seats, and an MC appeared. The big screens on the wall came to life with a count down to the appearance of the B&G.

The bride and groom came down the "isle". More like an elevated model's runway. They had a marriage ceremony. I saw rings exchanged, but have no idea what was said. Nothing religious, I'm sure. While they may exchange vows and such, the legalities are taken care of at some government office.

The bride and groom gave a very respectful bow to their parents, a gesture that I found very nice. Probably not going to happen in the US, right, girls?

The bride and groom then poured the first glass of Champagne. Actually, they poured the whole bottle over this pyramid of glasses, filling them all.

There were some short speeches (both fathers, plus some others), then it was over. As the bride and groom walked back down the isle, about 20 waiters appeared carrying the first dish.

The string quartet reappeared, and we enjoyed lots of food, and lots of drink.

The bride and groom cut the cake.

After a while, a piece of cake was delivered to our table.

Since you can’t eat wedding cake with chopsticks, they delivered forks to the table. That’s the fork, on top of the chopsticks.

These two girls came dancing down the runway. They were having a good time.

All the parents and the bride and groom, in two separate groups, visited each table. Here are the two fathers approaching a table.

I'm sure that I surprised both the bride and groom who had no idea a foreigner was going to attend.

Here’s our table about halfway through the meal. Actually, it must be getting towards the end because there is a fish on the table. That’s always one of the last dishes served.

I took this picture to show the way the local liquor pours. Just like charcoal lighter fluid. You should ingest them in about equal quantities. 103 proof. I declined.

Our server, pictured above, was responsible for our table and one other. I did not have to worry about my glass, or tea cup, going empty.

I did have to worry about those two guys across the table saying “gahn-bay”. I have two guide books that say that “gahn-bay” means “cheers”. Try it sometime. It means “bottoms-up”. If you want to say “cheers”, it is pronounced “cheers”.

I did enjoy the local wine. This is made just outside Qingdao.

These great folks sat at our table and took very good care of me. They always made sure I was the first to try every dish delivered to the table. Like, help, how do I eat this without embarrassing us all?

I took a picture of only one dish, which I was surprised to see. Henry said they served it because I was there. He was probably joking, because they served it to all 40 tables. Maybe not.

What’s so unusual? It’s American food. Sweet and sour pork. The only other time I have seen this in China, Henry and his brother ordered it as a joke. Here’s a tip. Don't expect the kind of food you get at your local Chinese restaurant in China. Everyone had exactly one bite.

Dinner with Henry's Friends

2010-06-16T08:56:00.001-07:00

My trips to China always include meeting amazing people. Henry has unbelievable contacts and friends. (For more, see blog entries from my earlier trips).

Henry was among the first Chinese kids that got to go to college. I guess the government decided that college was a better method of education than some of the others they had tried.

The selection process must have been pretty rigorous, because every one of Henry's classmates that I have met is a huge success. I've probably met a dozen over my four trips to China. The other evening we had dinner with two more of Henry's classmates, both women.

Me, Cheng Lin, Ma Yanhong, Xu Ming (Henry's brother), Henry (Xu Hang)

Ma Yanhong is the first Chinese woman to win an individual Olympic gold medal. My wife and I saw her do it in 1984 in Pauley Pavilion at UCLA when we attended the individual gymnastics finals for the 1984 Olympics.

As you can see from her Wikipedia page, that was not her last success.

Cheng Lin is a singer. She's very well known in China, and has done very well judging by her house. Very nice. When I'm back in the US I'll try to edit this entry to tell you why she doesn't perform in China much anymore, but if I put it in this email it probably won't reach you.

Go to the Music tab on her site and listen to some of her stuff. Pretty good, I think. She's well connected. I looked at a pictorial biography of Quincy Jones while the classmates were catching up (in Chinese). It had a full page note from Quincy, personally signed.

Don't think I was left out of the conversation. Both of these women have excellent English (Cheng Lin's may well be better than mine). And you will never meet more gracious people.

We dined at "The Orchard". Set in an apple orchard with a pond, it could have been in Ojai (California). They serve California cuisine and do a pretty good job. California wine, too. That's pretty rare here. Cheaper wines are from Australia, better ones from France. I had my first glass of wine since leaving the US.

California prices, too, not that Henry's friends care. I had lamb chops because I thought the steaks were overpriced. The lamb was very tasty, but tough as nails. Just what I expected. Two of the guys did order steaks. Always about 1/2" thick (before cooking) and lots of bones. Sometimes I wonder what they do with the parts of the beef and chicken that does not have bones in it. Probably not fit for eating.

At dinner, I was thinking that Outback should open a branch or two in China. These guys all like a good steak and they are simply not available. Well, guess what I came across in my wanderings today in Beijing--an Outback. I didn't go in to see what the steaks look like, though.

CIMES Machine Tool Trade Show

2010-06-15T03:49:00.001-07:00

For the last four days we have been attending the CIMES machine tool trade show. Here are the intro paragraphs from the show and venue Web sites:

CIMES is the largest machine Tool & Tools Exhibition in China & 3rd largest in the world, bringing together buyers from all corners the world with a key focus on 10 major industry group in China, to source new products and services over five trading days.

New China International Exhibition Center (NCIEC) is located at Tianzhu Airport Industrial and Commercial Zone in Shunyi District, Beijing. It consists of 8 exhibitions halls, boasting a gross indoor exhibition area of 100,000 square meters. With Convenient transport facilities, NCIEC neighbors the Capital International Airport in the east and Wenyu River Ecological corridor in the west. There is a first-class highway network around it. NCIEC is also convenient to reach by bus, subway, taxi and airport shuttle bus. A 24-hours parking lot is available opposite the NCIEC.

There are eight large halls in two rows of four with a central corridor connecting them all. It's big, but to put it into perspective, here are the sizes of a couple other well-known convention centers.

Las Vegas 3.2 million square feet (297,000 square meters)

Los Angeles 741,000 square feet (69,000 square meters)

Beijing 1 million square feet (93,000 square meters)

Here's the show Web site in case you want to look up your favorite vendor.

This show is aimed at Chinese manufacturers. Us foreigners are pretty rare. And many booths have no one that speaks English. Not a problem when Henry is around, but he's not always available. Luckily specifications and prices don't need an interpreter.

While we are looking for machine accessories and precision measuring tools, the full range of machine tools is represented. Including all the international brands of CNC machines that we used to see at WESTEC before it shrank to quarter size.

It is great to meet and talk to the people that make the products that we sell. They are invariably nice folks who are doing their best to turn out quality products. They appreciate the feedback we provide from the people that are using their products.

I've attended this show four times in six years. One change I have noticed is the improvement in the Chinese CNC machines. On my first visit it was very easy to walk the aisles and tell the Chinese-built CNC machines from the international standards like Haas and the European brands. The Chinese machines simply didn't look as polished as the others. It is now much harder to tell which is which. The Chinese machines now at least look as good as anyone's CNC machines.

Lots of laser cutting and marking machines. One laser was cutting 1/4" thick steel. The laser cutting machines work on huge sheets of thin metal. They excel at making many varied shaped holes, as seen on the back of a desktop computer.

Many of the laser marking machines would not be suitable for import into the US. Look carefully at the photo. See that bright dot? See any guards or shield? Tip: I did not take the photo through a glass or clear plastic panel. They almost invite you to swipe your hand through the beam just to see if it is hot.

As always, this show has some pretty big equipment. Some companies make a full range, from the smallest to the largest.

And some machines are simply huge.

Here's a booth I found interesting because of the "architecture".

Here's another large machine with a not atypical salesman ready to answer any question.

As at trade show everywhere, vendors strive to gain attention. I've never seen an electric cello before.

And finally, the Me Hoo both. Me Hoo is Henry's company that sells American tools in China.

Shopping in Beijing

2010-06-11T10:00:00.001-07:00

On my first trip to Beijing, about six years ago, Henry's niece Rue (say "Ray") took me to the Silk Market. At that time it was in an alley with a flea market feel. Now all those outdoor markets have been moved into buildings, and we visited one today.

It's pretty much an indoor flea market with 5 or 6 stories of flea market booths. You can buy all kinds of clothing, handbags, luggage, watches, small electronics and jewelry. There are many booths selling each kind of merchandise.

Our purchases included silk scarves, T-shirts, Tommy Bahama shirts, shoes, purses, and a suitcase. You can guess why the suitcase.

Many of the products have prices marked. For example, the Tommy Bahama shirts have a price tag with $110. Like right.

First thing is you better get your head around working in Yuan, and what the exchange rate is. Luckily, a Yuan is worth just about 15 cents. Actually, 14.6 cents. So converting Yuan into dollars is pretty easy. Take one and a half times the price in Yuan and divide by 10. So 400 Yuan is $60. (Actually $58.40, so you can see how close this horseback estimate is.)

Something that makes these calculations easier during negotiations is the language barrier. The globally universal way to communicate numbers these days is the calculator. Ask for a price and they will show it to you on a calculator. Next step is to ask what you will pay. How? By handing you the calculator. Do whatever math you want, then hand the calculator back with your first offer.

And if it is over 10% of their initial price you have lost already.

These folks know how to negotiate. They do it all day long every day. That clerk may look like a sweet little Chinese girl, but she has more experience negotiating than most traders on Wall Street.

If you are a good negotiator, you might get it for 25% of their initial price. But their bottom line is about 20%. The only way to find out if you have really reached their bottom line is to walk away. If they don't accept your last offer as you leave (and I mean you are at least two booths away), then you are below their bottom line.

But a lot of the fun is the negotiations. These folks are having fun and you can too. And we are not talking mega-bucks here, so if you overpay a few Yuan, just chalk it up to the experience.

For example, I purchased a $2000 Tachymetre Carrera watch today for about $30. I'm sure it is authentic, because the girl told me so, with the nicest twinkle in her eye. That's 200 Yuan, down from an initial price of 800 Yuan.

I could have gotten a similar watch for a quarter that price on the street, but there are different grades of fake watches, and the ones in the shops are somewhat better. (Or so I am told.)

Anyway, we had a fun afternoon, I spent less than $200, and came away with a watch, a nice pair of shoes, and gifts for everyone on my list. Can't do that at the local mall.

Shanghai Expo 2010

2010-06-10T10:18:00.001-07:00

There are lots of people at Expo 2010. Luckily for us it drizzled rain all day yesterday or we might have experienced this.

Rain is no problem. Henry had folding umbrellas for each of us when we met for breakfast (less than $3 each). It's 20 degrees (68°F), so it is the most comfortable I have been Shanghai.

We went on a tour bus so we could see the Chinese pavilion. About the only way to see it. The tour guide did an amazing job of herding us from the bus we arrived on, through security, onto and off of two packed Expo buses and to the pavilion.

Yes, it is big.

During the day we passed a sign by a queuing area that said "Wait from here 9 hours." That's for Saudi Arabia, the prime draw. And that was not the end. Japan & the US are also big draws. The US pavilion is reportedly pretty lame. Just a few videos.

Yet we walked right into the Libya exhibit. Very nice portrait of Qaddafi. (And not much else).

As you would expect, these things are big PR exhibits. The Greek exhibit sure made me want to go back.

Today we are going to visit the commercial area across the river. Hopefully a little more interesting than some of the countries.

Amazingly they have enough food and bathrooms for all these people.

I'm even more amazed at how well they designed that place.

Best pavilion we saw? General Motors.

Freeway Driving in China

2010-06-10T10:07:00.001-07:00

Over the last few days I have spent more than a few hours on the freeways of China. Chinese freeways are built pretty much to the standards of American freeways. The look is very familiar. But don't be fooled by the look of the road. We have all driven on a relatively busy freeway where traffic is moving about the speed limit, but there is one guy swerving from lane to lane doing 80.

OK. On Chinese freeways everyone is that guy swerving from lane to lane, trying to pass everyone else. Except for two very timid drivers who are always in the fast lane. And a few (or sometimes more than a few) trucks, who are swerving from lane to lane, but are simply not able to go 80. Say maybe 15.

Need to exit the freeway? That is generally done from the fast lane. Not sure which exit? Simply stop at the point of the gore and study the signs. It's the best viewing angle on the signs, and there is no need to worry that you are blocking two lanes.

One truck passing another? If the passer hasn't caught up with the passee, you can run up the right lane and switch to the left lane between the two trucks. Easy. Best done at a relative speed of at least 50 km/h.

Now add in a micro van from time to time. These miniature, underpowered, vehicles look like a 15 passenger van shrunk to half size. They are so underpowered that they are not allowed on freeways. Just that no one told the drivers. ALL drivers in China give these things a wide berth. No one wants their car to be anywhere that a micro van can hit them no matter which way the van goes, because there is absolutely no way to predict. I've been in a car that went from 120 km/h to 25 km/h just to pass one of these things on the freeway. Straight road, no other vehicles in sight. They demand respect! Breakdown? No need to pull to the side of the road. Stop in whatever lane you are in and pop the hood. Stand in front of the car so you can't see oncoming traffic. Might scare you. (Should scare you.) Oh, by the way, the freeways are clean. Thanks to the nice ladies that sweep them. Yes, in the lane with traffic. But they have safety equipment. Those faded orange vests give them Kings X, I'm pretty sure.

The Longest Day

2010-06-07T17:23:00.000-07:00

Let’s get this straight right from the start, I am not making any comparison to The Longest Day of my parents’ generation.

That said, getting to China takes awhile. Let’s look at my travel day.

I got up at the usual 6:45 AM (Pacific time) and went to work. I was able to put in a full day there before heading home. I had dinner and finished packing.

About 8:45 PM I headed for LAX for a 12:10 AM flight on Korean Airlines headed for Seoul. I give a lot of credit to KA. They have reasonable seat pitch and the seats recline quite a bit. I was able to sleep about 5 hours. It’s a 12.5 hour flight.

My only gripe with KA is that the flight attendants never desert the galleys during the flight. On most long flights the crew disappears and I can stand in the galley for two or three hours.

OK, we had a 3.5 hour layover in Seoul. That’s a great airport for transfers. You can take a shower and even get a massage. Unless you arrive at 4:30 AM when everything is closed. Oh, well.

The flight from Seoul to Qingdao is about 1.5 hours. Leave Seoul at 8:10 (Korean time) and arrive in Qingdao at 8:40 AM (China time). Pretty complete breakfast served on the flight.

We were met at the airport and delivered to Henry’s apartment where we showered. Then we watched the Lakers while Henry got a haircut.

Next stop was lunch. I had the best eggplant I have ever eaten. Grilled with many spices and whatnot.

In the afternoon we met with Henry’s graphic artist. She does all Henry’s advertising materials. From there we went to the Me Hoo office. Me Hoo is Henry’s business in Qingdao that sells American tools to Chinese factories. The Chinese know where to get quality tools.

After this we went to the cell phone store. Well, actually a block of shops that included 5 or 6 cell phone stores. Started with the one that had the most customers. We were looking for SIM cards for a couple of phones. Using my US phone would cost over $2 per minute. And every call in China would involve dialing an international call. By using a SIM from China I can make local calls for next to nothing, but I cannot make international calls. To do that I simply swap SIM cards.

The SIM cards cost 30 Yuan each. You get 35 Yuan worth of calls at 0.4 Yuan per minute. Something like 87 minutes. For $4.38. That will be plenty for my entire trip.

Being a bit pooped, we took a 1.5 hour nap before dinner.

Then we had the usual 12 dishes for 4 people for dinner. Mostly seafood at a restaurant overlooking a small boat harbor.

And to finish the evening we had a foot massage. Highly recommended. Some parts are a bit painful, but the results are well worth it.

Suffice it to say that I didn’t have trouble getting to sleep.

Getting Things Done in China

2008-10-22T20:06:00.000-07:00

Here are some snaps I took of how things get done in China. You might notice a common thread.

At the Olympic Park they were pulling out some heavy electrical cable that was probably used to power some of the temporary facilities. Check out how practical the vehicle is.

Need water for your new factory? It's cheaper to drill a well than to connect to city water.

And on most construction projects, the workers live on site for the duration. That's not two benches for work breaks in the tent, its two sets of bunk beds with a tarp over them.

Here's a portable air compressor.

This photo was taken at the Olympic Park in Qingdao where the sailing competition was held. They are removing lighter electrical cables.

Of course, most machining is done on manual machines.

And, it's easier to remove concrete in larger chunks if you have to a) break them by hand, and then b) pick up all the pieces.

Beijing 2008 Olympic Village

2008-10-22T19:39:00.000-07:00

Beijing is still the Olympic City. There are Beijing 2008 banners and billboards all over the city. Anywhere they don't want you to see something, they erect a fence or billboard like this, or a "One World, One Dream" version.

The Olympic park is impressive. The Bird's Nest in an impressive stadium. So big that I could never get a shot of the entire stadium.

And the nearby Water Cube is also impressive. It's much bigger than I thought.

The entire park has a coordinated theme. This is one of the lights near the Bird's Nest.

Across the street is the Olympic Village where the athletes lived. The tall building represents a dragon. It is on the center line axis of Beijing, at the north end, giving the city very good fung shui. Notice the big screen TVs on and between the buildings. They are now, of course, displaying advertising.

Here is a better shot of the lower screen. It's the biggest I have ever seen.

There were a lot of people around the Olympic Park. Nothing was open, we were all just wandering around looking at the buildings and such. Easily 50,000 people, and maybe twice that.

Signs

2008-10-22T19:09:00.000-07:00

More and more signs in China include English translations. That's good for me, as I only know the Chinese symbols for entrance (入口) and exit (出口).

But sometimes the translations are a little off the mark. Usually I just chuckle, but once in a while I pull out my camera and take a picture.

You have seen this one that describes the use of the shower valve in my hotel room.

Here's one we saw in front of a bar that, I think, makes an all-you-can-drink offer. Rob thought it was a strip club, which makes sense, as 100 yuan is a lot, even for all the beer you can drink.

Just because it is the name of your store doesn't mean that you have to take care with the translation.

And maybe I should just let you wonder what this sign means. Last night we had dinner at a German restaurant on a land-locked ship, that was adjacent to a driving range. We were supposed to keep an eye out for errant golf balls.

When the waitress noticed the three of us (including two Chinese guys) laughing at the translation, she fixed it by removing the extra C in wactch. All better now!

Chinese Hotels

2008-10-21T17:02:00.000-07:00

Let's start by saying that we don't stay in five star hotels when we visit China. There are of course world-class hotels that are no different in China than, say, Paris. I've been in the lobby of a couple. I think you could find a Holiday Inn in most cities that you could not tell from the one in Pittsburgh. And, of course, the rates are world-class, too.

When I am with Henry (who, as I am sure you have figured out, was born and grew up in China), we stay in in mid-range business hotels. I am writing this from a Motel 168 in ShenZhen. Motel 168 is a chain with about 35 locations in China. I can't stay in a hotel like this on my own because no one here speaks English.

When Henry booked the rooms here, he asked me if I wanted to upgrade to a larger room. As the upgrade added about $10.00 a day, I said yes. My room is almost 3 times as large as Henry's and includes the computer I am using. Pretty good value in my book, as Henry has trouble moving around the bed in his room.

There is about as much room this side of the bed as shown. A very spacious room by Chinese standards. Did I mention that, with the upgrade, this room will cost me about $45 a day?

OK, so we are in a room. Recognizable as a hotel room anywhere in the world. Always has all the required elements (including a western toilet). Maybe not as clean as in the US, but passable.

So check the bed. The Chinese have taken "firm" to a whole new meaning. Somewhere between brass and aluminum on the Rockwell B scale. The bed in my Beijing hotel room actually hurt when you sat down. Think of a piece of plywood with about a quarter inch of cotton padding on top.

I have a couple of strategies for dealing with the hard beds. If there are twin beds, I strip one bed of all the bedding and put it under the bottom sheet of the other bed. I also carry a Therma-Rest Z-seat, which is a 13" x 16" seating cushion for outdoor use. I use it under my hip, which suffers the most from the hard beds.

Bedding is always a thick comforter inside a big bag made of sheets. Since it is usually way too hot to use it, I sometimes take the comforter out of the bag. I put the comforter under me, and use the bag as a cover.

This room has a rather complicated shower valve. There are two shower heads (one fixed, one on a hose) plus a bottom outlet to fill a non-existent tub.

So they helpfully provide instructions on the use of this monstrosity.

At first glance, my room (shown above) looks pretty nice. Lots of up-scale amenities, and lots of glass. Architectural glass is used all over China. Scares me the most when they use it for floors, since I figure I am pretty well out of the design range for loading.

The reality is that the drawers don't work very well. The cabinet doors don't work very well. The shower door may or may not latch. There is always crud or mold in the corners of the showers. And we don't think that any hotel owns a vacuum cleaner. At least they don't use it in the guest rooms. Oh well.

Xi'an's City Wall

2008-10-21T07:03:00.000-07:00

The city of Xi'an was once totally enclosed by a city wall. The wall is still there, but the city which now has a population of some 7.3 million has expanded well beyond it.

The Xi'an wall in it's current form was built during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). While there have been many, many restorations, the wall itself has survived pretty much intact. Henry used to climb it when he was a school kit. Over the years, people took the bricks that surface the wall to build homes, but all that has been restored now.

This is the main gate. There are extensive fortifications around the gates, including two gates with a courtyard in between. If the attackers breach the first gate, archers can pick them off in the courtyard.

The wall is 13.7 km in length. That's 8.5 miles. It is 12 meters high (almost 40 feet) and 12 meters wide at the top. That's a lot of rammed earth!

The wall is also surrounded by a moat. And there are plenty of windows for archers to shoot at the enemy. I guess you can plink taxi cabs now days.

It's just a little incongruous that the view from the main gate is of the new subway being built.

There are a few replica weapons, such as this armored personnel carrier.

And this Mao-era air raid siren. Henry says they used to practice for air raids when he was a kid. I told him that we did too.

The Subterranean Army of Emperor Qin Shi Huang

2008-10-19T17:43:00.000-07:00

Qin Shi Huang was the first emperor to unify China. This was not done by diplomacy. Since he was quite a guy, he decided that he needed quite a tomb. Thus the terracotta army and other attractions within a few miles.

The terracotta army is impressive to say the least. There are three excavation sites, called Pit 1, Pit 2 and Pit 3.

Pit 1 contains some 6000 terracotta soldiers. Plus 40 chariots, each with 4 horses. It is 260 meters (850 feet) long and 62 meters (200 feet) wide. That's almost 6 football fields.

Pit 2 has 350 chariot horses, 116 cavalry horses, plus 900 solders and 89 chariots.

Pit 3 has 66 solders, 4 horses and one chariot. It is the headquarters for the terracotta army.

There is also a fourth pit which was dug, but no soldiers installed. It is about the magnitude of pit one. The emperor died fairly young, and they surmise that it just wasn't finished in time. This pit would have completed a typical fighting force of the day.

The ranks of soldiers that we have all seen photos of are all reconstructed from broken pieces found in the trenches. After the emperor died, there were peasant uprisings, and the area was broken into and burned. The fires burned the wooden chariots and the ceiling beams, so the roof fell in. I think the fire just sped up the process. It is not likely that the wooden roof would have survived for 2000 years, with or without fire.

These figures have been restored and are awaiting their return the the pit. Each figure is different. Each face is unique. And they were all carved and painted in quite a bit of detail.

Henry was busy yesterday, and didn't want to take the tour One More Time, so he helped arrange for a car and driver. The car was a Jetta-like VW with 282,000 km on it. A real sports car. Actually, having an underpowered car is an advantage here. Helps to limit the terror.

Anyway, car and driver for the day was 380 Yuan (about $57). That includes driving about 90 miles, tolls, and parking.

The driver speaks no English, so Henry wrote the names of the three attractions (the terracotta soldiers, a huge tomb mound where I guess the emperor resides, and a hot springs area with baths for the royals) on a card. He also wrote "help this guy buy a ticket". So I just showed the driver the card and pointed to the next thing on the list. Worked great.

At the end of the tour, I met Henry at a hot springs resort nearby for dinner. As Henry spent the night there, we needed the driver to wait through dinner to bring me back to the hotel. The driver was not up for this until Henry offered 100 yuan to wait. The driver was more than happy to hang around an extra five hours for an amount that probably doubled his income for the day.

How did the driver know where to meet Henry? I called Henry on my cell phone and handed the phone to the driver. When the driver had a question for me (did I want to stop and shop for souvenirs?), he called someone who spoke English and handed his phone to me. I thought it was kinda funny. His phone speaks English, mine speaks Chinese!

The hot springs area had hot baths for the emperor, the empress, and the emperor's favorite concubine. (I don't think this was the same emperor.) There were several hot springs and many buildings, the uses of which I am not sure. One nice looking building had a sign out front describing the toilets of the day. I thought it was a restoration or exhibit, but it turned out to be the bathroom.

These dancers were performing at the hot springs area (which I am sure has a proper name, but the ticket is all in Chinese).

The tomb mound was good exercise. Would have been a good view, I think, except it was foggy and rainy. I now have another folding umbrella that cost 10 yuan ($1.50). Worth every penny.

While working with an emperor was probably a pretty good gig, when the emperor died, things got a little tough. All the Emperor's brothers and top advisers were buried with him. Coincidence that they all died at the same time? I think not. Sounds to me like a good way for the new emperor to ensure a clean transition of power. The dead emperor surely needs them to help him in the afterlife.

Shanghai

2008-10-17T19:07:00.001-07:00

Getting to Shanghai was interesting. My flight details were in a text message on my phone in Chinese rendered in roman characters. The only way I know the name of the airline we were on is because I found a comment card in the seat pocket. One side is in English and shows the airline name--Juneyao Airlines. There are a lot of domestic Chinese airlines that never show up in the US. My boarding pass had no airline name or flight times on it. Probably good that we went directly to the gate as the flight pushed over 15 minutes early.

The flight was uneventful and Shao Yi Ping from SIEG was there to meet us.

This is the SIEG showroom. All their machines are on display for easy comparison. Also on display are a couple of their new CNC machines. That is Shao Yi Ping with me in the photo.

SIEG is expanding. They have leased space in the factory next door. There are now two large passageways between their plant and the new assembly area next door. It gives them about twice as much space for final assembly. Plus, they have opened a new plant for building their CNC machines. This is the CNC assembly area.

As usual, they are working on something new. This is a base casting for the machine that will become the X4 mill. Pretty stout.

All of the CNC machines are run in at the factory for 10 hours. These machines are moving all three axes during their run in period.

After a very productive meeting, and a tour of both plants, SIEG treated us to a very nice dinner and delivered us to our hotel.

The hotel is one block from Nanjing Road, two blocks from Peoples Square, and about a 10 minute walk from the Bund on the Haungpu River. This is where you want to be in Shanghai.

Our first evening there,we walked Nanjing Road to the river. For most of the way, Nanjing Road is a walking street with no cars. This is high-priced shopping with all the worlds luxury brands represented. Neon signs and big-screen billboards reach 5 or 6 stories into the sky.

And of course, besides the real branded items, there are plenty of fake Rolex watches and such available. You are sure to be accosted at least every 50 yards if you are over six feet tall and have round eyes.

I did take advantage of the situation to purchase a Prada bag for about $15.00. I'm pretty sure it is real. I'm getting a collection of small suitcases from Shanghai because for some reason I can't fit all my stuff into the suitcase I arrived with when I leave Shanghai. (In this case, however, it is because of the two big binders I got from SIEG. Not gifts for the kids. (Sorry girls.)

The Bund is a collection of European-style buildings along the Haungpu River. These buildings were build built by the English, French, and Germans about a hundred years ago. They are lit up at night and make an interesting sight. There are about 5 or 6 blocks of these buildings.

Across the river is Pudong. Fifteen years ago this was farmland. Now skyscrapers.

The Chinese have taken advertising to new levels. Many elevators have a flat-screen showing nonstop ads. And why waste a perfectly good river. This is a boat that's only job is to carry a floating advertisement up and down the river.

Not all of Shanghai is glamorous. This is the kind of street that we find interesting. This street has shops on the ground floor and housing above, which is the norm in Shanghai.

Qingdao, Tsingtao

2008-10-14T17:31:00.000-07:00

Both words are pronounced the same; "Chingdow". One is a city--Qingdao, and one is a beer Tsingtao. They are pretty much inseparable. Tsingtao is made in Qingdao. And much Tsingtao is drunk in Qingdao.

We arrived on the new "bullet train". The maximum speed I saw was 244 km/hr. That's just over 150 MPH. Faster than any train in the US, but not too fast compared to other high speed trains. But the trip took 6 hours instead of 13 hours on the train I took four years ago.

We are here to visit trading companies that gather tools from the many manufacturers in China and ship them to the United State. While their catalogs are surprisingly similar, they all have strengths in different areas. One trading company has the best selection and prices on machine accessories, another specializes in measuring tools. We have visited five companies so far.

At one stop we visited a new warehouse under construction. It's going to be a very nice facility.

To save on water fees, they are drilling their own well. The well drilling crew simply moves on site for the duration of the project.

That new warehouse is a mile down a small country road. This is typical of what one sees on that type of road.

Last night we had dinner at the Tsingtao brewery. Well, the original Tsingtao brewery. There are 4 or 5 around town. Plus a beer theme park. And yes, they serve food as well as beer.

The street the brewery is on is Deng Shou Road, but it is generally known as "beer street". The brewery is on one side, the other side is lined with restaurants with sidewalk dining.
The beer truck comes by a couple times a night to restock the restaurants. Look closely. It is a flatbed truck with kegs of beer on the back.

Beijing Duck

2008-10-12T19:23:00.000-07:00

Beijing Duck (known as Peking Duck to many of you) is one of the best dishes I have eaten. Don't visit Beijing without trying it. We had lunch at Quanjude, the oldest Beijing Duck restaurants. They give you a card with the serial number of your duck. Ours was 399,565. And I didn't even know that ducks had serial numbers. OK, so it is the number of ducks that the restaurant has served since 1864.

Lots of food in China is cheap. Beijing Duck, at one of these well-known restaurants is not. Lunch for three was 795 yuan (about $116). Like any city in the world, if you go to the famous restaurant in the middle of the five-star hotels you will pay New York prices. A couple blocks away we could have a good lunch for $1.50 each.

The restaurant is located on one of the major international shopping streets in Beijing--Wangfujing. All the internationa brands have shops here, and the prices are about 20% higher than in the US.

People

2008-10-12T17:13:00.000-07:00

On Sunday, we walked through Tian'anmen Square. Part of the 4 hours total we got to sightsee in Beijing.

Tian'anmen Square is the largest open urban square in the world. And on Sundays there are quite a few people there. Like maybe 100,000 or more. It's not easy estimating crowd sizes (ask the Pasadena police), but I was judging by the crowds we see at a full Rose Bowl game.

One of the draws in Tian'anmen Square is the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong. Apparently you can view the body. If you are willing to stand in line a while. I'm guessing the line was over half a mile long. It wrapped entirely around the building and snaked back and forth a couple times.

Henry says that travel to Beijing was restricted before and during the Olympics so there is a surge of tourists now.

There are a lot of things left over from the Olympics all over Beijing. In Tian'anmen Square there are some huge floral exhibits that look sort of like football field sized Rose Parade floats.

And of course, Tian'anmen Square is the gateway to the Forbidden City. Lots of people were headed that way too.

Six Degrees of Separation

2008-10-11T06:43:00.000-07:00

This evening we had dinner with some interesting people, all good friends of my colleague Henry Xu. The main character in this story is Su Hua. He is the son of Hua Guo-Feng, the second premier of the PRC. Su Hua is a retired air force officer, but he is obviously the son of a politician. He talked, pretty much non-stop for two hours.

The topics were clearly interesting, judging from the reaction of the others in attendance. I can't really be sure as it was all in Chinese.

But the food was excellent. The restaurant was, I think, a private club called the D-Villa International Club. It is in a gated area of condominiums.

The New Convention Center

2008-10-10T16:26:00.000-07:00

On Friday we visited the new convention center. It's big, and it is only half built. When you are trying to compare this to an American convention center, it is good to know that 1 square meter is pretty close to 10 square feet.

This is the foyer. There are 8 halls (so far) that I estimate to be 300' x 600'. I haven't done the math to see if that adds up to the totals given on the convention center Web site.

The four halls on one side are dedicated to Chinese manufacturers, while those on the other are for international manufacturers. All the big names in machine tools from around the world are here.

Here's a good-sized vertical boring mill. A boring mill is a lathe that has been stood on it's end. Notice that the table is a little blurry. It is turning.

And, of course, there is a lot of stuff that is of more direct interest to LittleMachineShop.com. It is great to talk to the manufacturers to find out what is new, and to help them understand what the American market wants.

CIMES 2008

2008-10-09T17:45:00.000-07:00

CIMES 2008 is the 9th China International Machine Tool & Tools Exhibition. It is held every other year in Beijing China.

They are moving the show to a new convention center, so about half the show is at the old convention center and half at the new one. Yesterday we visited the old convention center. Today we will go to the new one.

This is a domestic show. The international show is held on the years this show is dark. So I am a bit unusual here--a foreigner.

The military-looking guy in the photo? A security "guard". There are hundreds of them standing around the show. Usually young guys in ill-fitting uniforms. They love their uniforms here. In general, the more official-looking the uniform, the less important the job.

This is not a mini-lathe show. There is some big iron here. In fact, I have not seen any mini lathes as we know them, only a couple of pretty far-off variants.

But there are lots of tools here that we can use. The kind of booth we look for has a hundred variants on dial indicators, for example.

Some of the companies we have talked to are huge organizations with hundreds or thousands of workers. Some are small family businesses with 10 or 50 workers. But they are all run by good people that are interested in making quality products. At this point, some are just better at it than others.

We made it to Beijing

2008-10-08T19:00:00.000-07:00

Well, so much for visiting Soeul. Our Korean Air flight was canceled due to a bird strike. We were moved to an Air China flight.

We flew on a 747-400 Combi, which is half passenger and half freighter. Walk back through the plane and 2/3 of the way back is a wall. Cargo pallets behind the wall.

We arrived in Beijing at 5:30 AM. Big airport. We taxied for over 15 minutes. Then took a tram about a mile and a hlf to baggage claim-in the same building.

After a shower at our hotel, we headed for a day at the trade show. (More on that later.)

Our hotel rooms are on the bottom floor. One floor below ground level. There are holes outside the room so we can have a window. Kinda wierd, but a decent room. What do you want for 385 Yuan ($55).

Our hotel is located near Tian'anmen Square, amongst all the 5 star hotels. Our hotel does not have 5 stars (probably 3).

I'm off to China

2008-10-06T08:29:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow evening I leave for Beijing. I will be in China for 17 days.

For the first five days, I will be in Beijing, attending The China Int’l Machine Tool & Tools Exhibition-China Int’l Machinery & Equipment Show (CIMES).

I will be working in the MeHoo booth. MeHoo imports American tools into China. Chinese manufacturers want to improve their quality, and one way is to use better tools.

I will also be prowling the show looking for new products for LittleMachineShop.com.

On this trip I will fly Korean Air, with a stop in Seoul. I've never been to South Korea before, but I'm not sure a 4 hour stopover counts as a "visit".