This paper is concerned with a method of improving the utilisation of metal cutting machine tools and thus deals with that part of production covered by machining. It is particularly applicable to the Aircraft Industry, where the production of military aeroplanes must be as rapid as possible and the costs of civil aircraft in a competitive market must be kept to the minimum. As it is designed to be used in conjunction with small quantity manufacture it can be of great assistance in development work.

The limitation to the rate at which machining of any part can take place is generally dictated by the rate at which information can be transferred to a machine tool and converted into appropriate slide movements. In large scale manufacture where batch sizes are high, this transfer of information is normally effected by elaborate pre-set tooling arrangements and the cost and time required to prepare this information is acceptable only as the cost per part becomes very small.