8 ms·

Hmmm I don't know about that. Growing up my father was a tool maker (worked for Molex), that means he figured out how to make the molds people designed. That so

Hmmm I don't know about that. Growing up my father was a tool maker (worked for Molex), that means he figured out how to make the molds people designed. That sounds easy to some, but understanding how to cut different materials the right way is a pretty unique skill. Anyways, he basically trained his replacement(s) before they laid off a large portion of his machine shop. He trained probably 15 - 20 Chinese over the course of a few years. In the end, as expected, they laid him off. Fast forward 10 years and they had to bring a lot of the tool making back. Turns out the Chinese either had worse quality control or poorer skill, but they simply couldn't produce at the same level. You only need a few molds for a production line, but each needs to be near perfect. The Chinese couldn't do it. And even when they did / could, the intellectual property was often stolen, so competitors would pop up and customers would get pissed. You're correct automation is needed. However, so is high quality standards, higher education, higher moral codes / higher pay to keep people honest. The fact is, you can't really find skilled labor elsewhere easily (they want the same as the US wages). That's why the US's number one export is education, and probably why every company still fights over software engineers and really every STEM field. Unfortunately for manufacturing, the fight is over. When they tried to bring the tool making back there were very few people still doing it. Every single one of my dad's friends (including my dad) had moved on to other jobs. The fact is, all that tribal knowledgewas passed down from master to apprentice was lost. After they laid off the masters, there was/is no one left to really continue. Personally, I view this as a loss of critical mass and now our skills are likely no better than anywhere else, at least for tool making. I think this is a warning for every business. Sometimes it's worth paying the price to keep talent. Companies like Google, Apple, et al, know this. Hopefully, that will keep tech and a lot of the other large US companies from losing their way.

jasode 10y ago
>the Chinese either had worse quality control or poorer skill, but they simply couldn't produce at the same level. ... The Chinese couldn't do it. It seems that China's workers can make Macbooks and iPhones with high precision and low tolerances according to Apple's specifications. Were the Molex molds more complicated than that? In other words, if those specific 15-20 Chinese workers failed, maybe choosing a different set of 20 Chinese employees (or partner manufacturer) would have given the quality desired?
- eloff 10y ago
  I think that stands to reason, unless the OP wants to argue it's an innate defect of the Chinese as a race - which, to be clear, I don't think anyone is arguing. In outsourcing situations where you replace a highly-skilled and highly-paid worker with a low paid one in another country, you often get predictably bad results. Is it a cultural difference? Is it because of the compensation? Or just the attitudes of the companies involved on both sides and the kind of people they hire? I think like any complex issue, there's no one answer, but that last point sounds particularly convincing.
  - lettergram 10y ago
    I'm arguing that due to networking effects, having decades of tribal knowledge is worth the cost to keep it. Starting anew elsewhere, even with smart people can sometimes take decades to build that knowledge. Look at SF, every company competes in that market for software engineers because that's where the talent is. It's actually a concept explored by the book "The Talent Code", and even explains why so many people from puerto rico (by population) are so amazing at baseball. Everyone plays, everyone looks up to it, and everyone makes everyone else better.
    - upquark 10y ago
      This whole discussion is setting off my BS detectors (your comments specifically, dad with HS degree vs 'the Chinese', etc), and to be honest, the whole tribal knowledge thing may be much more wishful thinking than an actual true effect...
      - upquark 10y ago
        Do the esteemed downvoters care to substantiate their position with anything other than "my daddy said so" anecdotes?
    - wott 10y ago
      > Look at SF, every company competes in that market for software engineers because that's where the talent is. No, they bring the "talent" (God, I hate this word and what it carries) from everywhere across the country and abroad. They is no tesseract fuelled talent generator device hidden below SF.
elastic_church 10y ago
> However, so is high quality standards, higher education, higher moral codes / higher pay to keep people honest. So many presuppositions here that don't really support a future of a specialized American worker. China has weak to nonexistent intellectual property LAWS, and their Antitrust law was enacted just in 2008! Improvements in the general economy still result in a plethora of skilled workers across the entire planet, or in much greater quantity than the market needs. Today? Yes it is possible to renege on free trade treaties and close borders to pretend the uniqueness of a highly skilled American is inherent to quality goods, but these are not absolutes and can't be extrapolated into these impending economic dilemmas.
gonzo 10y ago
> Turns out the Chinese either had worse quality control or poorer skill, but they simply couldn't produce at the same level. China can, actually. We've had molds made for the smallworks.com products in both China and locally (Austin, TX) These molds, due to the desire to interface with LEGO products, have to produce products that are both "higly cosmetic" as well as dealing with the extreme tolerances of LEGO's system. It's about 1/3 the price to make the molds in China. Due to shipping and import duties, it's about the same price to run production in the US as in China.
- axonic 10y ago
  Thanks for pointing this out gonzo, when I checked out injection molded plastics and assembly in the Austin, TX area, I saw no reason to head overseas. I went into this thinking China would likely be my only affordable option but I was pleasantly surprised at how things balanced out in the end.
pizzetta 10y ago
I can only respond with second hand accounts about moving tools (wrenches, sockets, etc.) production overseas. Much of the quality has worsened (Craftsman, and your knockoff Kobalt, etc) but most people will not pay for Snap-on or SK tools, or Weha, Knipex and will buy the cheaper tools because for the weekend mechanic, having something that will last 20 years+ of daily beating isn't an issue.
- inferiorhuman 10y ago
  Craftsman quality went to shit before Apex moved production overseas. There's also a pretty big gap in price between Snap-On and Craftsman, a gap that companies like S-K and Wright seem to occupy. Of course S-K suffers because they don't have a great distribution network (something Craftsman and Snap-On do) and their quality just isn't where it was pre-bankruptcy. Thing is, Craftsman quality went to shit because Sears decided to compete solely on price. Apex/Danaher are plenty capable of turning out high quality tools in both their American and overseas plants (they own Armstrong, GearWrench, and Xcelite). They're also capable of producing shit tools for Sears. Turns out though that other companies (ex: Harbor Freight) can product comparable, if not superior, products for a lower cost.
- Spooky23 10y ago
  Tip: look at used tool places or yard sales, especially yard sales run by veterans. You'll find random brands you've never heard of that are "made in USA" and built to military spec. I think most military tools are required to be made domestically. The quality is amazing and prices low.
rokhayakebe 10y ago
Maybe they trained them insufficiently on purpose. I do not see how someone can willingly train anyone they know will get their job as soon as they are ready.
contingencies 10y ago
Counter-example. I was literally in some Chinese factories two weeks ago, one that makes molds for metal and a separate one that makes molds for plastics. Everything was automated. Even the major machines on the floor (5-axis metal CNCs, high powered laser cutters, etc.) all had digital interfaces. Some were Japanese, some were French, others were Chinese. There were entire rooms of people creating and updating models and validating injection flows using capable CAM software, apparently written in China and presumably with modeling algorithm implementations by Chinese mathematicians and programmers.
redsummer 10y ago
China can’t even make a ball-point pen: http://www.ejinsight.com/20160121-what-ball-pen-tells-us-about-china-s-manufacturing-weakness/ http://www.ejinsight.com/20160121-what-ball-pen-tells-us-abo... Or even ball-bearings: http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a20837/german-chinese-bearings-test/ http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a20837/german-chi... Most of China’s industrial robots are made by Germany, the US, and Japan. The Chinese are hopeless at precision engineering.
- germanier 10y ago
  The ball-point pen example had to be retired a few months ago: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2017-01/10/content_27914009.htm http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2017-01/10/content_279140...
- sdjdflkasdfja 10y ago
  I don't know if you are trolling or its your genuine world view. Although, I won't be surprised at all if it is. To say the Chinese is hopeless at precision engineering shows how narrow minded your world view is. The article you linked makes a huge assumption on why the Chinese import the ball bearings instead of manufactoring it themselves. A simple explanation why they don't import these bearings is because its not economically sound to do so. When the cost of importing a goods or service is cheaper than producing it yourself, you choose to import. Econ 101. And to transform that assumption to generalize a whole country's industry simply ignorant. All that article does is confirm your own internal bias.
norea-armozel 10y ago
I have a funny little story about outsourcing failures from my parents. Beechcraft for years has been trying to find ways get their costs down. They've been warring with the unions for years on everything: healthcare and wages mostly. So, when they started outsourcing to Mexico parts of aircraft like the wiring harness and the fuel bladders. As a result there's some bad blood between them and the Salina Kansas community. The union had no real way to force them to stay, so the jobs went. When Beechcraft setup the plants they offered above average wages (daily payment too) to workers in Mexico and even gave them their own tools (that was normal but any replacement tools for workers in the US had to be bought by the workers from the company at least as I remember with my mom complaining years having to buy hers when she use to work for them as well) but despite all that most workers in the Mexican plant would quit the first day and sometimes leave with not only their own tools but any other equipment they could find. So Beechcraft hired US contractors at a much higher price than former US employees to do the same work in Mexico (how does this work exactly? I really would love to talk with a former Beechcraft executive as to how they computed the financial numbers for this little venture someday.) and even then the quality of the fuel bladders and wiring harnesses were terrible. Most of the fuel bladders leaked and so they often had to be fixed at the Mexican plant (no plants state-side to do fixes were available). Last I heard from my dad who still works for them that they were trying to bring back some of that work to the US but in Arkansas. Frankly, I'll be surprised even then they'll get viable QA setup so long as they focus purely on the cost side of things.

jasode 10y ago

>the Chinese either had worse quality control or poorer skill, but they simply couldn't produce at the same level. ... The Chinese couldn't do it. It seems that China's workers can make Macbooks and iPhones with high precision and low tolerances according to Apple's specifications. Were the Molex molds more complicated than that? In other words, if those specific 15-20 Chinese workers failed, maybe choosing a different set of 20 Chinese employees (or partner manufacturer) would have given the quality desired?

eloff 10y ago
I think that stands to reason, unless the OP wants to argue it's an innate defect of the Chinese as a race - which, to be clear, I don't think anyone is arguing. In outsourcing situations where you replace a highly-skilled and highly-paid worker with a low paid one in another country, you often get predictably bad results. Is it a cultural difference? Is it because of the compensation? Or just the attitudes of the companies involved on both sides and the kind of people they hire? I think like any complex issue, there's no one answer, but that last point sounds particularly convincing.
- lettergram 10y ago
  I'm arguing that due to networking effects, having decades of tribal knowledge is worth the cost to keep it. Starting anew elsewhere, even with smart people can sometimes take decades to build that knowledge. Look at SF, every company competes in that market for software engineers because that's where the talent is. It's actually a concept explored by the book "The Talent Code", and even explains why so many people from puerto rico (by population) are so amazing at baseball. Everyone plays, everyone looks up to it, and everyone makes everyone else better.
  - upquark 10y ago
    This whole discussion is setting off my BS detectors (your comments specifically, dad with HS degree vs 'the Chinese', etc), and to be honest, the whole tribal knowledge thing may be much more wishful thinking than an actual true effect...
    - upquark 10y ago
      Do the esteemed downvoters care to substantiate their position with anything other than "my daddy said so" anecdotes?
  - wott 10y ago
    > Look at SF, every company competes in that market for software engineers because that's where the talent is. No, they bring the "talent" (God, I hate this word and what it carries) from everywhere across the country and abroad. They is no tesseract fuelled talent generator device hidden below SF.

elastic_church 10y ago

> However, so is high quality standards, higher education, higher moral codes / higher pay to keep people honest. So many presuppositions here that don't really support a future of a specialized American worker. China has weak to nonexistent intellectual property LAWS, and their Antitrust law was enacted just in 2008! Improvements in the general economy still result in a plethora of skilled workers across the entire planet, or in much greater quantity than the market needs. Today? Yes it is possible to renege on free trade treaties and close borders to pretend the uniqueness of a highly skilled American is inherent to quality goods, but these are not absolutes and can't be extrapolated into these impending economic dilemmas.

gonzo 10y ago

> Turns out the Chinese either had worse quality control or poorer skill, but they simply couldn't produce at the same level. China can, actually. We've had molds made for the smallworks.com products in both China and locally (Austin, TX) These molds, due to the desire to interface with LEGO products, have to produce products that are both "higly cosmetic" as well as dealing with the extreme tolerances of LEGO's system. It's about 1/3 the price to make the molds in China. Due to shipping and import duties, it's about the same price to run production in the US as in China.

axonic 10y ago
Thanks for pointing this out gonzo, when I checked out injection molded plastics and assembly in the Austin, TX area, I saw no reason to head overseas. I went into this thinking China would likely be my only affordable option but I was pleasantly surprised at how things balanced out in the end.

pizzetta 10y ago

I can only respond with second hand accounts about moving tools (wrenches, sockets, etc.) production overseas. Much of the quality has worsened (Craftsman, and your knockoff Kobalt, etc) but most people will not pay for Snap-on or SK tools, or Weha, Knipex and will buy the cheaper tools because for the weekend mechanic, having something that will last 20 years+ of daily beating isn't an issue.

inferiorhuman 10y ago
Craftsman quality went to shit before Apex moved production overseas. There's also a pretty big gap in price between Snap-On and Craftsman, a gap that companies like S-K and Wright seem to occupy. Of course S-K suffers because they don't have a great distribution network (something Craftsman and Snap-On do) and their quality just isn't where it was pre-bankruptcy. Thing is, Craftsman quality went to shit because Sears decided to compete solely on price. Apex/Danaher are plenty capable of turning out high quality tools in both their American and overseas plants (they own Armstrong, GearWrench, and Xcelite). They're also capable of producing shit tools for Sears. Turns out though that other companies (ex: Harbor Freight) can product comparable, if not superior, products for a lower cost.
Spooky23 10y ago
Tip: look at used tool places or yard sales, especially yard sales run by veterans. You'll find random brands you've never heard of that are "made in USA" and built to military spec. I think most military tools are required to be made domestically. The quality is amazing and prices low.

rokhayakebe 10y ago

Maybe they trained them insufficiently on purpose. I do not see how someone can willingly train anyone they know will get their job as soon as they are ready.

contingencies 10y ago

Counter-example. I was literally in some Chinese factories two weeks ago, one that makes molds for metal and a separate one that makes molds for plastics. Everything was automated. Even the major machines on the floor (5-axis metal CNCs, high powered laser cutters, etc.) all had digital interfaces. Some were Japanese, some were French, others were Chinese. There were entire rooms of people creating and updating models and validating injection flows using capable CAM software, apparently written in China and presumably with modeling algorithm implementations by Chinese mathematicians and programmers.

redsummer 10y ago

China can’t even make a ball-point pen: http://www.ejinsight.com/20160121-what-ball-pen-tells-us-about-china-s-manufacturing-weakness/ http://www.ejinsight.com/20160121-what-ball-pen-tells-us-abo... Or even ball-bearings: http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a20837/german-chinese-bearings-test/ http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a20837/german-chi... Most of China’s industrial robots are made by Germany, the US, and Japan. The Chinese are hopeless at precision engineering.

germanier 10y ago
The ball-point pen example had to be retired a few months ago: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2017-01/10/content_27914009.htm http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2017-01/10/content_279140...
sdjdflkasdfja 10y ago
I don't know if you are trolling or its your genuine world view. Although, I won't be surprised at all if it is. To say the Chinese is hopeless at precision engineering shows how narrow minded your world view is. The article you linked makes a huge assumption on why the Chinese import the ball bearings instead of manufactoring it themselves. A simple explanation why they don't import these bearings is because its not economically sound to do so. When the cost of importing a goods or service is cheaper than producing it yourself, you choose to import. Econ 101. And to transform that assumption to generalize a whole country's industry simply ignorant. All that article does is confirm your own internal bias.

norea-armozel 10y ago

I have a funny little story about outsourcing failures from my parents. Beechcraft for years has been trying to find ways get their costs down. They've been warring with the unions for years on everything: healthcare and wages mostly. So, when they started outsourcing to Mexico parts of aircraft like the wiring harness and the fuel bladders. As a result there's some bad blood between them and the Salina Kansas community. The union had no real way to force them to stay, so the jobs went. When Beechcraft setup the plants they offered above average wages (daily payment too) to workers in Mexico and even gave them their own tools (that was normal but any replacement tools for workers in the US had to be bought by the workers from the company at least as I remember with my mom complaining years having to buy hers when she use to work for them as well) but despite all that most workers in the Mexican plant would quit the first day and sometimes leave with not only their own tools but any other equipment they could find. So Beechcraft hired US contractors at a much higher price than former US employees to do the same work in Mexico (how does this work exactly? I really would love to talk with a former Beechcraft executive as to how they computed the financial numbers for this little venture someday.) and even then the quality of the fuel bladders and wiring harnesses were terrible. Most of the fuel bladders leaked and so they often had to be fixed at the Mexican plant (no plants state-side to do fixes were available). Last I heard from my dad who still works for them that they were trying to bring back some of that work to the US but in Arkansas. Frankly, I'll be surprised even then they'll get viable QA setup so long as they focus purely on the cost side of things.