TABLE OF CONTENTS Numerical Control technology as known today, emerged in the mid 20th century. It can be traced to the year of 1952, the U.S. Air Force, Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, MA, USA, and the name of John Parsons (1913 2007), who is closely associated with the invention of numerical control. It was not applied in production manufacturing until the early 1960's. The real boom came in the form of CNC, around the year of 1972, and a decade later with the introduction of affordable micro computers. History and development of this fascinating technology has been well documented in many publications.
In manufacturing field, and particularly in the area of metal working, Numerical Control technology has caused something of a revolution. Even in the days before computers became standard fixtures in every company and many homes, machine tools equipped with Numerical Control system found their special place in many machine shops. The relatively recent evolution of micro electronics and the never ceasing computer development, including its impact on Numerical Control, has brought enormously significant changes to manufacturing sector in general and metal-working industry in particular.
In various publications and articles, many descriptions have been used during the years, to define what Numerical Control actually is. It would be pointless to try to find yet another definition, just for the purpose of this handbook. Many of these definitions share the same idea, same basic concept, just use different wording.
The majority of all the known definitions...
