The following thoughts and ideas were accumulated by 30 years of machining successes and failures, reading magazine articles, and looking over other machinist's shoulders. Most of these tricks have to do with manual machining but many can be adapted to CNC machine work. Don't be surprised if you see some fabricating and hot work ideas as well. I will try to give credit where credit is due and many thanks to Guy Lautard (Author of The Machinist's Bedside Reader) www.lautard.com for his help and insight. All drawings are free hand but should be good enough to give you an idea of what I'm talking about. If you're familiar with an idea presented here, just move on to the next topic.