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SkillsUSA Champion

Royce
Royce represented Missouri in the National SkillsUSA Championship held in Kansas City
Last year, North Technical Precision Machining student Royce Walls returned from the State SkillsUSA Competition at Linn State Technical College with a 1st place CNC Turning Technology gold medal and represented Missouir in the National Competition held in Kansas City. Royce is interested in making a career out of machinig and hopes to attend Ranken Technical College after High School.

The Precision Machining team as a whole made a tremendous showing at Linn State Technical College, with all seven members successfully medaling in their respective contests. Cameron Dozier, Cameron Gregory, and Thaddaeus Pinkins won bronze medals in the Automated Manufacturing Technology contest. Paul Kelley and Jared Cheatham won silver and bronze medals in CNC Milling.

Instructor Brett Smith spent time between the State contests and the National Convention preparing Royce for the Computer Numeric Control (CNC) Turning Technology championships in Kansans City. The CNC Turning Technology contest requires competitors to write a CNC program that will machine a given material into a part that meets the specifications of a dimensional drawing. The competition could potentially last for 6 to 8 hours, depending on the project design given. The resulting machined part is then evaluated by judges to declare a winner.

Percision Wins
CNC Milling Technology winners Paul and Jarred receive thier silver and bronze medals
Royce can undoubtedly attribute a large part of his success to time spent on the Haas Automation TL-1 Lathe, a modern high-performance computer numerical control (CNC) system recently incorporated into the Precision Machining Program at North Technical High School. Instructor Brett Smith says "Royce never complains, has a good work ethic, is always willing to learn, and many times will take the initiative to just learn things on his own."

Royce participated in a variety of contest related activities over the duration of his competition week in Kansas City. He attended the Opening Ceremony, Contest Debriefing Luncheon, CNC Turning Competition, Closing Ceremony and SkillsUSA TechSpo. Amid his hard work, Royce was able to relax at the CoCo Key West Water Park, his favorite memory of the trip, and attended the Kansas City Royals vs. Arizona Diamondbacks game.

During the CNC Turning competition Royce was able to effectively write his assigned program which was then successfully run by the judges. Royce was competent enough to secure a 9th place win in the National CNC Turning contest, an impressive standing for a Junior. When asked what piece of advice could he pass on to his fellow machining programmers from his learning experience at the National Contest, Royce said, "use G28."

Skills 2011 Nationals 031
North Tech principal Mr. Powers and Royce Walls on thier way to the KC Royals vs. AZ Diamondbacks game
G-code is the language used to tell computerized machine tools what to make and how to make it. The "what" and "how" are mostly defined by instructions on where to move to, how fast to move, and through what path to move. The G28 code instructs the machine to return to home position, the machines' reference point. Similar to what the G28 code does to the machine, Royce returned home after the week's competition to grow and develop as a machinist and prepare him for his Senior year and another chance at becoming the National Champion.

Congratulations to Royce and good luck to all North Technical's SkillsUSA participants as they prepare for the upcoming district contests this February.