Survey
* Your assessment is very important for improving the workof artificial intelligence, which forms the content of this project
* Your assessment is very important for improving the workof artificial intelligence, which forms the content of this project
Evolution of the State of Manufacturing Up Until the Mid-1800’s custom-made products skilled craftsmen (blacksmith, cooper, …) much human energy, some wind and water power Turn of the Century (end of 1800’s/beginning of 1900’s) increasing wealth stimulates great demand for conventional and new products steam engine - machines controlled by cams and linkages, driven by belts via common drive shaft these machines become the backbone of automated factories to produce a variety of complex, mostly custom-made, products example Electricity electromotor and electric switching components are invented each machine tool can be provided with its own power drive a factory can be configured in various ways depending on the required layout of the manufacturing system the factory can be tailored towards a specific application Rigid Flowline Production concept of division of labor/mass production and part interchangeability (Henry Ford) rigid flowline production (assembly line) high quality products become available to many people who previously were unable to afford the expensive custom-made products due to enormous investment, rigid flowline production can’t be altered easily market becomes saturated with standard products manufacturing system needs to become more flexible Other Inventions Shape the Manufacturing System vacuum tubes and transistors make it possible to build machine controllers that can be reprogrammed to a limited degree - can now produce various product variants the numerical controller (NC) is invented at MIT in 1947 combining hardware and software technologies in one control unit - allowing machining of complex, low volume parts Integrated Circuits transistors and other electronic components are integrated into very compact circuits (VLSI, very large-scale integration) micro, mini, and mainframe computers become available for controlling manufacturing processes (PLCs, programmable logic controllers) Computer Integrated Manufacturing all activities that make and shape (not only machining) a product are integrated for example the communication between planning and control and the manufacturing floor responsiveness to market/customer More Recent Developments Read “... major operations-related concepts that have been popular since the 1980s.” (ref. Jacobs and Chase) Sustainability/Green Read “A Revolution in the Making” (Wall Street Journal, June 11, 2013)