Star Cutter’s Grinding Technologies: A fully integrated manufacturer

Since 1927, the Star Cutter Co. has been manufacturing right here in the United States but continues to expand and diversify their product portfolio. In our August issue of Defense and Munitions, we covered Star Cutter Co.’s H.B. Carbide division, but their ability to go from powder production through finished ground blanks is only one of Star Cutter Co.’s offerings. Now we’ll focus on their Grinding Technologies division based in Elk Rapids, Michigan.

Much like their other divisions, Star Cutter’s Grinding Technologies began manufacturing for their own use before expanding to the outside market. Now they design and manufacture solutions for CNC tool grinding addressing custom or high-volume manufacturing applications and reconditioning of end mills, high performance drills, drill points, step drills, form tools, gear tools, broach tools, medical tools, inserts, and other custom tools. They also expanded their business with the acquisition of Tru Tech technologies in September 2023 by adding capabilities for blank prep and outside diameter (O.D.) grinding. Now Grinding Technologies has five machines built under the Tru Tech brand and four other machine lineups, including their current flagship platform, the NXT Tool Grinder, and the FLX Tool Grinder, pushing the limits of their 9,500ft2 production area. Grinding Technologies already had a strong foothold in the firearms and ammunition manufacturing industries, but the Tru Tech acquisition further solidified their standing with original equipment manufacturers (OEMs).

“We were able to grow in the firearms manufacturing industry with the acquisition of Tru Tech because they already had machines in there,” says Aaron Remsing, national sales manager – Star CNC Tool Grinders. “These were new opportunities presented by adding the Tru Tech line to our portfolio. Number one, it’s a little bit lower cost. Number two, it’s very easy to set up. Number three, it’s very easy to change over from diameter size so it gets us in a lot more places than we were.”

Like anything in life, a solid base or foundation is crucial. Some of Grinding Technologies’ machines require a poly granite poured base from an Ohio supplier, while approximately 80% of their bases are fabricated in Michigan. It’s one of the many steps in the supply chain where Star Cutter looks to keep production in the United States.

There’s a lot of pride in the people that are here.”

A broach grinding machine, O.D. grinding machine, or 5-axis grinding machine can go on top of those bases, getting as big as 2,400mm between the centers.

“It’s a long way from where it was five years ago, seven years ago, where we’re now pushing out a significantly higher number of machines,” Remsing says.

Grinding Technologies’ team of approximately 45 engineers is on track to launch four new machines in a five-year period. Their engineering team, however, isn’t solely focused on bringing something new to market but also updating their current product lines.

“It’s allowing us to take a proven, trusted machine platform and bring new technology to it, bring in automation capabilities, in-process gaging, all the different technology that should be available in modern machines,” says Bradley Cooper, plant manager at the Grinding Technologies facility in Elk Rapids. “We see where we’re missing in some market regions. But it’s been good, too, because it’s allowed us to take those machines and make them Star Cutter Co. machines.”

Exhibit A, their FLX Tool Grinder. Star Cutter was looking to enter the standard carbide tooling market after seeing OEMs buying and replacing grinding machines every year to make catalog standard products. After missing out on orders, Remsing asked a potential catalog standard product customer for a reason and the customer told him they needed more automation capacity in a machine. The FLX was designed to hold 5-, 10-, or 15-wheel packs with up to 1,100 tools, making it a dedicated, lights-out production machine with a 30% to 40% smaller footprint than their NXT Tool Grinder.

“We didn’t sacrifice any quality or performance to get to that point,” Remsing says. “Really, what we did was we went back to machine tool basics.”

Grinding Technologies is also committed to their customers’ experience so they invested in a demo area in the Elk Rapids facility so their own engineers and potential customers can see the machines in action and work through any problems before delivering the final machine. “We changed quite a few things to accommodate more machine types and really make it a functioning work cell. We can take stuff off, put it in the machine, show the customer the whole value stream,” Cooper says. “We added some inspection equipment last year; it’s been a huge help for reverse engineering tools and being able to prove excellence in tool grinding right on the spot.”

Another way Grinding Technologies helps customers is an extensive inventory. More than half of their 33,000ft² facility is dedicated to storage of new parts for assembly and spare parts to service and support eight different machine lines, some of which have been in service for more than 30 years. That inventory and storage help Cooper’s team maintain a competitive 12- to 15-week lead time on most machine assemblies with their largest machine, the Star UTG Series Broach Grinder, maintaining a 6- to 8-month lead time, depending on the model.

The inventory, revamped demo area, expanded offerings, and a renovation of the offices in the facility all shine a light on what Star Cutter believes is their best asset at the Elk Rapids facility, their staff.

“There’s a lot of pride in the people that are here. The team right out of the gate was focusing more on our vision, instead of living in the day to day,” Remsing says. “Where are we going to be? If you look at a team of roughly 45 people, our innovation in the engineering side to launch four new machines in a five-year period, it’s a small team to do that with, it’s no small feat to build a machine from the ground up in a year, but that’s what we do.”

About the author: Jake Kauffman is the senior editor for GIE Media’s Manufacturing Group and can be reached at JKauffman@gie.net.

Star Cutter Co.
https://starcutter.com