East West Manufacturing Blog

Casting -- one of the oldest known manufacturing techniques -- is a process in which liquid material (e.g. molten metal) is poured into a mold cavity and hardened. After removing the piece from the mold, various finishing treatments can be applied to create a dazzling final product. This process is used primarily to manufacture complex solid and...

Have you ever wished for an easy, all-in-one-place guide to the most cost-effective locations for specific manufacturing processes? Maybe you’re thinking, “No, but now that you mention it…” 😊

Let’s be honest. With a show of hands, when we say strategic sourcing, how many of you think this concept is really just about buying at the cheapest price? While engineers and brand managers get most of the credit for successful new product development and commercialization of product launches, the unsung hero is often the team who wears the...

You’ve found your new manufacturing services provider! YAY!

But that manufacturer is only as good as its weakest link. It’s up to you to know all about the companies supplying your manufacturer. It’s time for supplier evaluations, and we've got a list of questions for a supplier evaluation checklist.

Hey, we get it. No one, NO ONE, likes to wait. But there are ways to mitigate the potential delays in ordering electronic assemblies containing long lead time (LLT) components.

Of all the questions we hear, "why did my quote change" is one of the simplest and toughest to answer. The quote changed because of...well...change. But the reasons for the change can be complicated. In fact there might be more than one reason why your quote changed. Let's take a look at some of the factors that can cause an adjustment to your...

If you’ve looked around websites for contract manufacturers (CM) or manufacturers in general, you might have seen the phrase “engineered products.” Maybe you’ve even thought, “What’s an engineered product?” After all, isn’t everything that’s made an engineered product of some type?

Everything we know is being disrupted. The way we buy groceries or read the newspaper (what’s a newspaper?), the way we travel and communicate. Fueled by breakneck advances in technology, disruption has made its way into every industry, including manufacturing.

Rework happens. 

In fact, a 2013 study by the Lenox Institute of Technology of more than 100 industrial metal-cutting operations found that, “regardless of the percentage of machine uptime reported, respondents admitted that finished products don’t pass first inspection 20% of the time and require rework.”

Have you ever heard the phrase "driveway moments"? The term was coined by NPR to describe those stories you can't leave. You pull into the driveway, put the car in park and just sit there until the story is over — it's that compelling. 

A few stories that I read the past few weeks fall into that category. If I was listening to the radio and got...