5 ms·
30 years ago I walked into a facility (in order to help them with some computer issues) and at the time their main production equipment was over 100 years old,
by southern_cross 7y ago
30 years ago I walked into a facility (in order to help them with some computer issues) and at the time their main production equipment was over 100 years old, but still going strong. (It had a "Made in 1875" nameplate on it.) They kept it in good working order, and were in no hurry to replace it, either, except that the EPA was forcing their hand because the old equipment couldn't meet modern environmental standards.
Incidentally, the mindset that you reference above is also the same mindset which causes places to not kept sufficient spare parts on hand so that fixes can be made quickly. It seems that they would rather experience extended downtime than pay to have spare parts on hand which could minimize that downtime.
- philpem 7y agoWhat you're describing there is a somewhat perverted version of "Lean" manufacturing. Example - there's a production line that's been running 20 years on a 1980s computer. For continuity reasons, there are two spares in the warehouse. There hasn't been a failure in years, the spares are kept because finding replacements would be near-impossible. Some management consultant rides in screeching about how these two mission-critical systems are "sunk cost" and "need to be disposed of to make the place clean and tidy". So they are. Three weeks later, the primary fails and there are no spares...