Impressive

[John]

Always impressed by the chrome plating on modern taps and other bathroom fittings. Perhaps the castings are finished better before plating, but certainly a step change from olden stuff.

[Andy Burns]

Physical vapour deposition, instead of a traditional pickling bath?

[Brian Gaff (Sofa 2)]

Yes I remember getting a chard of plating in my hand nonce from a so called chromium plated tap. I had my suspicions it was some other material or that the tap had not been clean when the process was done. Brian

[harry]

In the case of traditional chrome plating, the base metal was/is copper plated first, then nickel then chrome. If any of these are left out, you get a poor result.

[Mike Halmarack]

The bath taps in my first home bristled with the stuff. I thought is was a special fish scale design.

[John]

Andy Burns [e-mail] wrote in news:h64m89FjqnoU1 @mid.individual.net:

dunno _ Plating was a very nasty process for the environment

[newshound]

I expect that whatever the brand the basic bits come from the east. Big firms can afford to have a metallurgist chop up a sample, doesn't meet spec, reject the batch. The suppliers have two strong incentives to do it properly. Reputation and commercial risk.

Did an audit of a british plating firm a year or so ago. Their speciality is refurbishing big expensive stuff for MOD, landing gear for Dowty, Rolls Royce aero, and nuclear power valves. It was like walking into a museum of British industrial history. They had lathes with a 12 metre bed, vertical lathes with a three metre faceplate and perhaps five metres vertically. Almost all were pre-war, I wouldn't be surprised if they had earlier stuff. Practically nothing digital in sight, apart from a few displacement indicators.

The plating shop was (superficially) as mucky as you would expect. But, they sure knew their shit.

Their biggest business threat was from their 70 year olds keeling over. Quite a humbling experience.

[alan_m]

Possibly true but having to rely totally on an ageing workforce and ageing equipment is not a recipe for future success.

Just because something has "always been done this way" does not necessarily mean that it is the best way, nor the most efficient or cost effective way.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Conversely just because it is the 'new way' does not mean it is the best way, nor the most efficient or cost effective way.

Cf Project Binky:-)

[Roger Hayter]

What both cases have in common is the lack of scope for economies of scale. One off repairs do not lend themselves to mass production, and therefore investing hundreds of miilions so that, after a day of planning, a one off part can be made in tens of seconds rather than a couple of hours doesn't make sense.

[John]

Fantastic skill - but not repeatable by another person.

[John]

Remember "Monday Cars" from BMC?

A modern factory will have factors like lighting, heating, humidity all controlled. Planned maintenance and calibration will be carried out.

I recall a tale of the ideal factory having a workforce of one man and a dog. The dog's job was to bite the man if he fiddled with the process.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Odd to think that 'factory ' was once 'manufactory' for a place where people make stuff by hand

[tabbypurr]

no-one said it was. However they're clearly very skilled and choose to do it the way they do. It does seem likely they know best.

Generally speaking people do talk a fair bit of rubbish about old equipment.

Industries that can't find young skilled people have not a lot of option but to rely on the old folk. There seem to be some key skills that are dying off.

NT

[Brian Gaff (Sofa 2)]

Its a bit like what used to happen to some metal car bumpers when the surface cracked. What you get now is plastic and if you are really lucky that very shin coated stuff. Brian

[Brian Gaff (Sofa 2)]

Hmm well its difficult back in the 80s I had the misfortune to visit a plating company in Twickenham. Lets just say that it stank and was filthy and I wonder how many of the staff actually survived to retirement! Brian

[Fredxx]

Project Binky is perhaps a good example when skilled personnel take a ridiculous number of hours for a product that could never fetch it's true commercial cost.

The most effective way would be a CNC way, but that requires investment, something that is probably alien to this company.

[The Natural Philosopher]

No. thats is bollocks. I hand carved and sanded a slab of oak to a smooth finish in less time than it would have taken to set up a router to do the same job,.

I do design in 3D CAD for model planes. GFrankly it would be quicker to sketch it out in pencil on wall paper like I used to. I just like 3D modelling.

i dug a hole for a post by hand in less time than it would have taken to get a digger on hire.

We are too fixated om the 'machine' way.

For one offs its easier to use non CNC tools

[Fredxx]

For one-offs, maybe. But there is little or no business in making such.

Of course you weren't paid to dig the hole, or carving slabs of oak, were you?

[alan_m]

That is driven by the need to reduce weight for fuel economy and to do less damage to pedestrians when you run into them.