In a world where machine shops are struggling to stay open and maintain their business and in a day when “going into dad’s business” is not what it once was, Platinum Tooling Technologies, Inc. is an exception to the rule. Located in Prospect Heights, Illinois, the company is set to reach an important milestone.

​In 2022, company President Preben Hansen and his family will celebrate 100 years working in metal cutting and four generations of Hansen men in the industry. How cool is that?

The story began with Preben’s grandfather, Louis Eckart Hansen, who learned his trade in Copenhagen, Denmark in the early 1900s. Louis worked as a machinist in the Danish Navy’s repair facility. Preben’s father, Svend Eckart Hansen, honed his skills under the guidance of Louis.

In 1958, Svend emigrated with his family, including young Preben, to the U.S. Despite not knowing English, he found employment within days of arriving in Chicago, because of his skill as a tool maker. Svend began his career as a machinist and ended it in the 1990s as a master tool maker at Ramcel Precision Stamping and Manufacturing LLC in Northbrook, Illinois.

With manufacturing and tooling in his DNA, Preben worked in the machine shop of the former Fulton Machine Company in downtown Chicago, while attending the University of Illinois/ Chicago and pursuing a degree in engineering. Following college, he worked in the shop at Oakley Industries building custom machinery.

​After several years in the shop, Preben moved to the front office and into an inside sales position. Later, at Jemco Tool & Die, he learned programming and set-up on their CNC lathes and machining centers which was his introduction to machine tools and their accessories. His next job was at HPI, now known as Pioneer Heartech Precision Inc., a distributor of tool holders and related products, in Elk Grove Village, Illinois.

Preben started as an Outside Sales representative of tool holders and rotary tables, then became the company’s Sales Manager. This was followed by work at Lyndex-Nikken, another machine tool accessory supplier in Mundelein, Illinois. Here, Preben was introduced to live tools and once again worked as Sales Manager.

​In 2010, Preben started a joint venture with heimatec GmbH, becoming the President of Heimatec, Inc., a company specializing in live tools, angle heads and multi-spindle drill heads. In 2018, Heimatec, Inc. was purchased by Platinum Tooling Technologies, Inc. with headquarters located in Prospect Heights, Illinois. Preben Hansen is the COO and President at Platinum Tooling.

In total, Preben has over 30 years of experience in the machine tool accessory market and over 40 years in the manufacturing industry. Given his credentials, it’s no surprise that Preben has established himself as a leading authority on these topics in the North American machine tool accessory market. He often hosts knowledge bars at trade shows to SRO crowds.

In keeping with this family tradition, Preben’s son, Luke Hansen, joined his dad’s company in 2018 as a Technical Sales Specialist for several of the product lines sold by Platinum Tooling, including Tecnicrafts collets and guide bushings for Swiss machines. After graduating from high school, Luke joined the army in search of his calling and received great training there. Upon his discharge, he decided to put into practice the motivational and goal orientation skills he had learned in the military. In his current position at Platinum Tooling, Luke continues to expand his knowledge of the machine tool accessory market as well as build valuable relationships with the North American sales and distribution network of the company.
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Reflecting on 100 years as a family in the manufacturing industry, Preben Hansen says, “The machine tool industry has been and continues to be an extremely vital part of our country’s continued success. My son Luke and I are proud to be 3rd and 4th generation professionals involved in this exciting industry.”

Platinum Tooling Technologies, Inc. in Prospect Heights, IL, serves its growing North American customer base with an extensive inventory of machine tool accessories. Its experienced staff is dedicated to providing the most innovative tooling and technology. Platinum Tooling Technologies, Inc. serves the auto, aero, medical, woodworking, composites and other industries, as well as an ever-increasing number of machine tool OEMs worldwide, through its network of manufacturers’ representatives. Platinum Tooling is the importer of Heimatec, Henninger, Tecnicrafts and AMF Tooling for North America

We hope you can join Platinum Tooling for a FREE online Webinar hosted by GIE Media, Inc., this Thursday, June 17th at 9am to 9:30 am (Pacific time).

During this Manufacturing event, Preben Hansen, President of Platinum Tooling and longtime leading expert in the machine tool accessory market, will detail recent advancements in live tooling, angle heads and speed increasers.

In 2010, Preben started a partnership with Heimatec GmbH to be the exclusive importer of Heimatec products in North America. From there he grew his business and in 2018, bought out heimatec and formed his new company, Platinum Tooling Technologies, Inc (PTTI). PTTI became the importer for North America of heimatec products, along with several other machine tool accessory lines, including Henninger, Tecnicrafts, and AMF.
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It’s easy to sign up…simply click the link below to register:

Standard and custom styles available for Hyundai, Miyano and Nakamura machine tools; offered for all tapers, including HSK and BT30; fixed and adjustable models; many in stock for immediate delivery.

By Industrial Machinery Digest. March 16, 2021

Heimatec, a world leader in live tools and multi-spindle drill heads, today announces immediate availability of live tooling for all popular models in the Hyundai, Miyano and Nakamura turning center lines. 

​According to master North American importer for Heimatec, Preben Hansen, Platinum Tooling Technologies, Inc. President, “We’re carrying a substantial inventory of live tools for our customers’ machines now and it represents a substantial financial and warehouse space commitment we’ve made to support them in the North American market.”

Hansen added that the company will be announcing its in-stock arrangement for many other lines of machine tools, moving forward, as the company commits a major investment to the market. 

Platinum Tooling Technologies, Inc. serves its North American customers with a full team of manufacturers’ rep firms, plus its Chicagoland facility offers stocking, repair, application engineering and service for the company’s line of live tools, multi-spindle tool, adapters, UTEC® right angle heads and other items offered.

Literature detailing all the Heimatec products now available in stock for Hyundai, Miyano and Nakamura machining centers is offered at the company’s website, www.platinumtooling.com.   Interested parties may also contact the company directly with inquiries.

Heimatec offers a full one-year warranty on all parts and labor for its tooling.

Are you utilizing your machine to the fullest? 
Welcome to 2021! Now more than ever, it is critical to evaluate your manufacturing processes to be sure you are maximizing your current machine tools’ capabilities.

Take advantage of this IMTS 2020 Special Offer and get the best performing BMT 65 tools on the market…improve your finish, tolerances, and cutter life with these Heimatec tools.

Act now and save 30% on your BMT 65 purchase of part numbers 8 010 66 079-H or 8 030 66 097-H.

These BMT 65 tools offered through Platinum Tooling feature Heimatec’s patented u-tec flexible changing system, heavy duty combination bearings, and high torque output.

These standard axial and radial tools come complete with a FREE set of wrenches. In order to receive this special offer, you must use the part #’s as shown.

Offer valid on any quantity while supplies last.

by Bernard Martin

Sacramento, CA. -  Next Generation Tooling, LLC, a manufacturer's representative agency, founded in 1995 and servicing the California Nevada Arizona, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico CNC manufacturing markets has just opened TWO offices in California.

Most of Next Generation Tooling's customers know them as "the Next Gen guys" according to Chris Savolainen, the Founder and President of 'Next Gen Tooling'.

What was the rationale of opening not one, but two offices when the entire team has worked out of their own home offices for years?

"We've grown our market service area quite a bit since we started out servicing just Northern California.  We now include most of the Western States of the US.  We've s been adding some of the best technical CNC application people we can find to support the unique mix of principles we represent. The products that we represent are what are considered very high performance tooling and workholding.  It's some of the premiere products in our entire industry! We determined that we really needed a place to provide on-site technical training.  We also needed to carry some inventory to support the unique needs of the aerospace, medical, electronics and defense industries that we support." Said Savolainen.

Rob Aldama, Vice-President of Next Gen Tool picks up the story,  "At first we thought that one training and showroom might be good enough, but as we started talk to our distributor, machine dealer and end-user manufacturing customers, we discovered that there was a real need for facilities in both Northern and Southern California. None of our competitors are providing the deep technical service that has helped us gain market share, so we really felt we should just take it to the next level and open two facilities."

With the Covid-19 pandemic raging there are not a lot of companies expanding. Most are cutting costs and employees. When asked about this both Chris and Rob stated that their team of people have remained pretty busy throughout this entire period. 

Chris said "We get asked in to shops to provide technical support pretty often. Putting on the full body PPE suits has been kind of common for us during the past few months." 

Rob picked it up from there, "I think we may be some of the really select few that have been asked to come into shops because we're not just taking orders, we're reducing cycle time and we're improving efficiency"

Chris jumped back in, "And maybe its a little bit self serving,  We can have the equipment set-up at both locations instead of trying to bring it into a facility.  It's actually a lot easier, faster and safer to bring people to one of our locations rather than try to move things with lots  of sweat and heavy breathing in PPE." 

"Yea, We can bring people to either location and do the training.  There are far less interruptions and the I think people learn a lot more, and learn it faster" stated Rob.

What types of training do they provide at Next Gen's new buildings?  They start off with a lot of fundamentals that people running CNC machines may never had any formal training about. That's where their basic Training Classes fit in.

But they also can go much deeper with their Advanced Part Manufacturing training series

• Programming Tool Path – Climb versus Conventional
• Material Machinability – Cubic Inches of Stock Removal
• Part Set Up / Workholding  & Fixturing
  
• Tool Holder Selection, Collet, Solid, Hydraulic, Shrink Fit
• Cutting Tool Selection – Substrate, Geometry, Coating, Speed and Feeds 
• Estimating Part Cycle Time

Breaking NEWS from Platinum Tooling: ER Collet Chucks are available in single or double ended style and come in various lengths. Offered in both metric or inch sizes, these tools can be ordered in round or with flats.

Tecnicrafts manufactures these toolholders to a tight run out tolerance of 5 microns or less and adheres to the h6 standard for shank diameter.

All Tecnicrafts Collets and Guide Bushings are available in Standard and Ultra-Precision grades.

The bore profiles include Round, Square, Hexagon, Rectangle and Custom as per customer specifications.

The collets are offered in steel and carbide lined versions with Grooved, Smooth, or Serrated bores in Standard and Long Nose types.

Special V-line and Over-Grip collets are also available.

Tecnicrafts Guide Bushings are generally offered in carbide lining with U-line, Over-Grip, and Extended Nose & Long Bores available.

For quick delivery, Platinum Tooling inventories the most common sizes and styles of Collets & Guide Bushings at their headquarters located in Prospect Heights, Illinois. Non-standard items are available to ship within 3-4 weeks.