Curlie

Machinery and Tools

This category serves as a collection point for a host of sites put together by individuals, companies, and organizations that make, sell, service, or are otherwise concerned with the machinery, equipment, tooling, accessories, and consumables used by a wide range of industrial manufacturers. The category breaks the sites into groups that relate to either a main type of equipment or a particular field of industrial operation. Many of these groups are further broken down into subcategories that each assemble sites that have something in common with one another. An important point about all the sites is their focus on the equipment used in manufacturing an end product or achieving an end result. This is quite different from concern about the raw material involved in the manufacturing process. Sites of that sort belong in the relevant Resources industry categories. Note: Although over 5000 sites are distributed among the numerous subcategories that make up this Machinery and Tools section of the Open Directory, a relatively small percentage of them are indexed in five "above the line" categories: Associations, Directories, Employment, Technical Services, and Used Machinery. The focus in each case is on a general or all encompassing application to users of machinery and tools rather than on a narrower relationship to a specific industry or manufacturing process. Additional note: Several dozen sites are indexed, too, below the list of subcategories on this page. They represent companies that feature a diversified or out-of-the-ordinary range of products or services and are therefore difficult -- if not impossible -- to include elsewhere. A few of them do, at first glance, appear to have a relationship to a given subcategory, but the diversification of their interests and activities suggests that they are more justifiably listed under this "catch-all" heading.

For quicker placement in the directory please follow these Submission Tips:

Title: Name of Business or Organization

Description: This describes the website and should note distinguishing features found on the site without the use of hype, personal pronouns, or repetitive terms.

Assembly Equipment

This category focuses on companies involved in designing and supplying largely automated systems for assembling a variety of manufactured products. It includes equipment for automatically fastening, riveting, drilling, screw insertion and tightening, and performing similar operations that would otherwise have to be done manually. It also extends to systems and devices for testing and packaging finished products. Note: In effect, the sites indexed here are concerned only with a particular aspect of automated manufacturing. Those that deal with other - and often more extensive - forms of automation belong in - and should be directed to - the main category at http://dmoz.org/Business/Industries/Manufacturing/Factory_Automation/ or one of its subcategories.

For quicker placement in the directory please follow these Submission Tips:

Title: Name of Business or Organization

Description: This describes the website and should note distinguishing features found on the site without the use of hype, personal pronouns, or repetitive terms.

Associations

Official websites of international, national, and area trade associations that focus on one kind of manufacturing or another. They usually include lists of members and often provide details of current activities, forthcoming events, and general business news, trends, and commentary.

Auctions and Internet Trading

This category serves as a general collection point for companies engaged in selling, buying, and trading new and used manufacturing equipment. Most of them have an appeal to more than one industry and usually include photographs and technical details of their current inventory. Where auctions sites are involved, they also show the status of bids to date. Note: Despite the title of this category, it does -- and can -- include some manufacturer sites, especially where the product range doesn't readily fit elsewhere. As just one example, hand and power tools aimed at a wide variety of markets can belong here, particularly if they aren't appropriate for the Hydraulic and Pneumatic category. Additional note: The separate Used Machinery category also contains a list of possible sources for equipment of a general nature. However, where equipment is restricted to use by a specific industry or applies to a particular type of processing, a site is usually more appropriately indexed elsewhere -- as in the numerous listings to be found throughout the various subcategories that make up this Machinery and Tools section of the Open Directory. Thus, someone with an interest in balancing machines is more likely to find what they're looking for under that heading rather than in either this Auctions and Internet Trading or the Used Machinery one.

Balancing Machinery and Tools

This category is concerned with the range of systems and components that test and overcome imbalances and vibration in a wide variety of manufacturing and processing machines, particularly those that involve rotating parts. Note: The emphasis in this category is on balancing equipment used in various industries, but there is a notable exception in the case of wheel balancing equipment and weights used in the car and truck aftermarket. Sites of this nature are more logically included in the Vehicles_Repair_and_Maintenance category. Additional note: Although a few manufacturers also provide balancing services, such activity is more the province of local machine shops. Sites of this nature can be found at -- and should be directed to -- the appropriate Regional location, which can be found within the breakdown shown at Business/Industries/Manufacturing/Casting,_Molding,_Machining/Machine_Shops/Full_Service/Regional/

Building Materials Manufacturing Machinery

This category indexes sites dealing with equipment and supplies used in the building and construction trades. The focus is on the processing of building materials, the manufacture of end products and building components, and the tools used by installers and tradespeople.

Converting Equipment

This category contains sites concerned with the manufacture and servicing of machinery and equipment involved in converting web and sheet material from a raw state to a partial or fully finished form. The material is generally confined to paper, board, film, foil, and some nonwovens, although there is an occasional but warranted exception. The converting processes include a wide range of operations such as unwinding/rewinding, cutting/slitting, glueing/coating/laminating, formation of bags and packages, embossing/perforating/hole punching, and counting/batching/packaging/delivery systems. Note: To a degree, sites related to converting machinery can also be found in the Printing, Packaging, Paper, and Textile/Nonwovens categories. In such cases, however, the equipment tends to be an internal extension of the industry's manufacturing focus rather than the basis of a distinctly separate converting business.

Custom Machinery Builders

This category contains sites involved in the design and building of one-of-a-kind machines and equipment for a wide range of manufacturing and processing companies. The emphasis is on a needs analysis, appropriate conceptual design, and eventual production and installation. Note: Any firm that simply offers customized machinery in its customary field of equipment should direct its site to the category in which it and its competitors are normally to be found. Thus, a special purpose laminating machine manufacturer belongs in the Converting category, while a company offering customized industrial heating equipment should be allocated to the Furnaces,_Incinerators,_Kilns one. Note: Some parallel exists between this Custom Machinery Builders category and the Technical Services one, in which, there too, the emphasis is on a source of advice and supply that a given manufacturer is unlikely to find available within the normal scope of things.

Cutting and Machining

This category contains sites concerned with the sale and service of equipment used in the metalworking industry and, in several cases, with extended or alternative applications for shaping and forming plastic, stone, and wood materials. The selection varies from hand tools to advanced and sophisticated machinery, and the objective is the fabrication of parts and components needed for a wide variety of purposes. Such products are at the heart of the Machine Shop business and are also frequently turned out in house by machinery manufacturers for their own use -- and, not the least, for incorporation in the machinery the companies build. Note: The focus in this category is on the manufacture, supply, and service of equipment. In contrast, sites put together by users of the equipment (such as Machine Shops) are listed in the Casting, Molding, Machining categories.

Directories

Sites that provide detailed information of companies and individuals engaged in a broad range of manufacturing industries. A number of online publications, which serve much the same purpose, are also indexed in this category. Note: Although many of the sites listed in this Directories category have a commercial aspect to them (and this is in contrast to the overall information provided by the sites indexed in the Associations category), a greater emphasis on the haves and wants of the marketplace can be found in the sites that are contained in the Auctions_and_Internet_Trading category -- or in the used machinery segments of categories such as Process_Equipment and Machine_Tools.

Employment

Sites related to job openings in the range of industries served by the Machinery and Tools categories. Includes recruiting and employment agencies. Job seekers who are so inclined may post their resumes here, too.

Engines

This category lists sites for (re-)manufacturers or suppliers of combustion engines, engine components or related equipment, serving more than one application type.

Before submiting a site please take time to review the Business submission guidelines.

Please submit to the most specific appropriate subcategory, if one exists. Sites with a limited geographic scope should be submitted to the appropriate location category in Regional.

If the site provides a method for mail-order or online purchasing, it should be submitted to Shopping: Vehicles: Parts and Accessories: Engine.

Etching, Embossing, Marking

Sites identifying sources of equipment, services, and accessories involved in adding marks, textures, or decorative finishes to metallic and non-metallic surfaces, industrial and commercial products or components, and, in a few cases, specialized materials and items. The process technology varies, but the end result is invariably one of two things. There is either the addition (or occasionally the removal) of a mark, imprint, or texture to (or from) the original. Or the process leads to the creation of an intricate shape or uniquely finished product. Note: Suppliers of etching equipment often have a particular, and even exclusive, focus on the semi-conductor industry, and sites of this nature are better indexed in the Business/Electronics_and_Electrical/ categories. Additional note: Manufacturers of laser marking and engraving equipment often include models designed for cutting, drilling, and welding materials -- and sometimes the reverse applies. Where the emphasis is on cutting type machines rather than marking ones, sites should be more properly directed to -- and will be found in -- the Business/Industrial_Goods_and_Services/Machinery_and_Tools/Cutting_and_Machining/Cutting_Machinery/Lasers/ category. Note re commercial embossing work: The printing industry includes embossing as one of its capabilities, although the results are obtained through the use of dies rather than with industrial embossing machinery. An extensive, alphabetized collection of sources for this kind of work can be found in the Business/Publishing_and_Printing/Printing/Full_Service_and_Commercial/ category, with the geographical location being indicated in most cases.

Furnaces, Incinerators, Kilns

This category contains sites related to the manufacture, distribution, and servicing of industrial equipment and systems that are primarily used for heat generation and for melting or incinerating a range of materials and waste byproducts. It includes furnaces, ovens, kilns, crucibles, and other devices that use direct or indirect heat provided by solid fuel, gas, oil, or electricity, or, in a few cases, rely on heat generated by alternative means. The applications vary widely and cover a host of different industries. Note: Heat treatment processes also frequently depend on the use of furnaces and similar equipment. Thus, the Thermal_Process category -- which is focused on the steps taken in advancing the condition of materials and manufactured parts towards a desired finished state -- contains an additional number of furnace type sites. It therefore makes some sense for searchers and submitters to look at both this Furnaces_Incinerators_Kilns category and the Thermal_Process one to determine where their interests are likely to be best served.

Hydraulic and Pneumatic

This category indexes sites involved in the supply and service of relatively simple hydraulic and pneumatic tools; a broad range of more complex machinery and equipment (such as presses and handling/lifting systems) that make use of fluid and air power technology; and the components (such as hose and valves) and accessories (such as power packs) that make everything possible.

Please only submit sites offering Hydraulic and Pneumatic presses.

Industrial Metrology

Metrology is the scientific study of measurement. Legal metrology is the part of metrology where regulations are implemented in order to ensure an appropriate level of credibility in measurement results whenever conflicting interests exist, or when incorrect measurement results may adversely affect individuals or society itself. (Not to be confused with meteorology -- the study of the processes and phenomena of the atmosphere, especially as a means of forecasting the weather.)

Please check that your site is not a manufacturing or service coompant. If it is, it would be submitted into a lower category here.

Leatherworking Machinery

This category contains sites of special purpose equipment and accessory suppliers serving the leather processing and shoe manufacturing industries. It can also be of some interest to manufacturers making plastic and rubber footware.

Plasma Technology

This category includes private companies dealing with plasma physics applications and technology

This is a new category

Plating, Polishing Equipment

This category contains sites concerned with two main aspects of finishing or altering the nature or surfaces of parts made from metal and a small variety of other materials. On the one hand, the focus is on such processes as cleaning, deburring, degreasing, polishing, and generally improving the appearance of something. On the other hand, the interest is in changing its original or final composition through such processes as electroless or electrolytic plating. Note: There is a certain degree of overlap in the sites gathered in this category and others that are scattered through other parts of the Machinery_and_Tools segment of the Open Directory Project. To mention only two examples, centrifuges have a category all of their own and many machine tool sites feature deburring equipment. However, although the distinctions are perhaps somewhat fine, the essential rationale for including a site in this Plating,_Polishing category is the focus on the finishing industries rather than the process and metalworking ones.

Process Equipment

This category -- and the subcategories included with it -- brings together sites concerned with the supply and service of machines, systems, and associated ancillary equipment that, in one way or another, alter the nature or condition of batches of materials, components, or parts that have so far probably been only partially manufactured. In some cases, the end result is a finished product. In others, the processing is merely a step along the way. Whatever the case, a change certainly occurs between the input and output stages. Note: Process Equipment sites usually have applications to a range of industries rather than one specific type of manufacturing. In contrast, sites that have an obvious relationship to a particular area of manufacturing are indexed in categories that conform with that relationship. (For example metalworking machinery is allocated to the Cutting_Equipment and Machine_Tools categories, just as tanning equipment and shoe making machines will be found in the Leatherworking_Machinery category.)

Sandblasting

This category contains sites concerned with the manufacture, sale, and service of surface preparation and finishing equipment that uses some form of abrasive media to produce a deburred, descaled, cleaned, or finished result. By extension, the category includes sources of supply for such related products as air compressors, fittings, guns, hoses, and, of course, the abrasives themselves.

Note: Some equipment manufacturers offer to do sandblasting and the like for customers, but the majority of companies that specialize in this type of service tend to confine themselves to a reasonably local market. Sites of this kind should therefore be more properly directed to appropriate Regional/Localities categories, rather than expecting to have themselves indexed in this or any other Business section of the Curlie Directory.

Snowmaking

The Snowmaking category focuses on the business of manufacturing, distributing, and marketing of snowmaking machines such as snow machines, and snowguns.

Submit sites whose primary focus is the manufacturing, distributing and marketing of snowmaking machines such as snow machines, and snowguns.

Technical Services

Engineering and similar companies that provide specialized services of a generally advanced or unique nature to manufacturers who are unlikely to have inhouse access to them. Examples include performance analysis, emergency repairs, significant equipment upgrades and retrofits, and the dismantling, movement, and reassembly of heavy machinery.br>In most cases, these services are available to a broad range of manufacturers and often on a worldwide basis.

Sites listed here will represent businesses providing generalized technical services over a wide area.

Sites about the design, supply and maintenance of special purpose machinery belong in Business/Industrial_Goods_and_Services/Machinery_and_Tools/Custom_Machinery_Builders.

Sites with a focus on a specific machining service or product belong in the appropriate subcategory of Business/Industrial_Goods_and_Services/Casting,_Molding,_Machining/Machine_Shops

Sites for companies with a limited geographic range are more correctly listed in the appropriate Regional category.

Test Equipment

This category contains sites related to the manufacture, supply, and servicing of instruments, devices, and equipment used to ensure the safe, efficient, and effective operation and condition of machinery, machine parts, and a variety of manufactured items. Some sites have a narrow application to an industry or product, but most have a broad range of applicability. In turn, while outside testing is preferred from time to time, the norm is to carry it out on the shop floor, as an attached or integral part of machinery, or through an in-house laboratory. Often enough, too, the testing process forms part of a predictive or preventive maintenance program.

Please submit site only relating to environmenatl test chambers.

Thermal Process

This category contains sites related to the manufacture, distribution, and servicing of industrial equipment used in a variety of heat transfer processes. The objective is to heat or cool products as a part of a process application or manufacturing procedure. Examples include annealing, brazing, hardening, and tempering metal parts, as well as baking, drying, curing, and bonding materials and products in several different industries. Note: A quite considerable number of furnace type sites are also indexed in a category of their own, reflecting their application beyond the heat treatment one. Searchers and submitters are therefore advised to look at the Furnaces_Incinerators_Kilns category and well as this Thermal_Process one to determine where their interests are likely to be best served. Note: The accompanying Heat_Exchanger subcategory has its own description. In a sense, it deals with equipment designed to transfer heat from one medium to another.

Several industrial sectors have their own category for industry-specific refrigeration and cooling, which are linked from this category. Companies focusing on one of these sectors will be listed in the corresponding category. Companies whose activities span several sectors, or whose focus sector does not have its own refrigeration category, will be listed here.

Companies involved in manufacture or supply of home refrigeration appliances are listed in Appliances. Those focusing on cooling ambient air in buildings are listed in HVAC.

Used Machinery

This category provides sources of used and reconditioned machinery for a variety of industrial and fabricating fields. They differ, at least to some degree, from the sites indexed in the Auctions_and_Internet_Trading category in which the emphasis is on the bidding method of disposal. Note: When used and surplus inventory is confined to one specific industry or machine type, with almost no applications outside it, a source is more likely to be found in the related category rather than in this more general one. Examples of this difference in indexing can be found in such categories as Cleaning_Equipment and Machine_Tools/Used.

Vehicle Repair and Maintenance

The intended use of this category is for manufacturers and or distributors of equipment and or tools designed for professional use by businesses that provide technical and or repair service for private or public sector vehicles utilized for the transportation of products or people.

Please submit manufacturer and or distributors sits offering equipment and or tools designed for professional use by autobody or businesses that provide technical and or repair service.

Shopping sites that offer products products, prices and a way to order them over the internet should be submitted to Shopping/Tools/Vehicle_Repair/

If a company repairs vehicles or supplies parts for vehicles, it should be submitted to the locality the business is in. Begin searching for the proper category here:

Regional".

Welding Equipment

Sites for companies whose product range is not strongly focused on filler metals should be submitted in the category above.

Woodworking Machinery

This category contains sites put together by manufacturers and distributors of woodworking machinery. Product lines include production machinery, material handling systems, and tooling used to manufacture furniture, doors and windows, architectural millwork, picture frames, dimensional lumber, and wood products in general. Note: The focus of this category is on industrial applications. Where sites are aimed at the home hobbyist instead, they more properly belong in either the Shopping/Tools/Woodworking/ category or Arts/Crafts/Woodcraft/Woodworking/. Additional note: Sites concerned with sawmill and plywood and panel production also fall outside the scope of this category. Instead they should be listed in the Business/Agriculture_and_Forestry/Forestry_Products_and_Equipment/ category.