The Synchrotron Radiation Instrumentation 1995 Conference (SRI’95) was hosted by the Advanced Photon Source (APS) at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL). Of the many workshops within the conference, the SRI’95 Workshop 2 was ‘‘Innovations in the Design of Mechanical Components of a Beamline.’’ The workshop was well attended with over 140 registrants. The following topics were discussed. Industry’s perspective on the status and future was provided by Huber Diffraktionstechnik GMBH on goniometers/diffractometers, Oxford Instruments on advanced manufacturing technique of high heat load components, such as the APS photon shutter, and Kohzu Seiki Co. Ltd. on the specialties of monochromators provided to the third-generation synchrotrons. This was followed by a description of the engineering of a dual function monochromator design for water-cooled diamond or cryogenically cooled silicon monochromators by CMC CAT/APS. Another category was the nagging problem of sensitivity of the photon beam position monitors (XBPM) to bending magnet radiation (‘‘BM contamination’’) and the undulator magnet gap changes. Problem descriptions and suggested solutions were provided by both the Advanced Light Source (ALS) and the APS. Other innovative ideas were the cooling schemes (enhanced cooling of beamline components using metallic porous meshes including cryo-cooled applications); Glidcop photon shutter design using microchannels at the ALS; and window/filter design, manufacture and operational experiences at CHESS and PETRA/HASYLAB. Additional discussions were held on designing for micromotions and precision in the optical support systems and smart user filter schemes. This is a summary of the presentations at the Workshop.