
When the Work Piles Up and the Programs Don't | 46
From The Impractical Machinists by Practical Machinist
March 31, 2026 · 1h 30m · Season 2 · Episode 46
About this episode
The episode discusses repair work, quoting strategies for complex projects, and the integration of AI tools in machining.
The guys kick things off talking about the realities of repair and walk-in work, then get into quoting strategy — specifically what to do when a customer hands you a massive stack of confusing prints and expects a price by Tuesday. From there it's community questions: trusting manufacturer speeds and feeds, probing from CAM, machine warm-up routines, and how AI tools like ChatGPT are actually finding their way into everyday shop life. Brad shares advice on finding enough work to go full time,...
Topics covered
- repair work
- quoting strategy
- manufacturing
- AI tools
- community questions
Keywords
- repair
- quoting
- manufacturing
- AI
- ChatGPT
- machine warm-up
- community questions
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: ChatGPT
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