Old Four-Slide Wire Forming Machine

[Tim9]

I would agree that it's probably "shop Built" The company I worked for designed and built about 90% of it's processing and packaging machinery in house. We built things from smaller than a bread box to over 2 stories high, 12 feet wide, and 200 feet long. In order to stay ahead of the competition the machinery had to be more efficient and be able to last longer than any competitive product on the market.

I recall going to a trade show one year to look at competing machinery. When I approached one vendor asking the expected lifespan of a particular machine the sales person proudly explained "if the machine was worked hard (40 hours per week) it would easily last up to 10 years". The machines we designed and built for the same purpose were currently being run 80 to 100 hours per week (depending on product demand) and were approaching the 45 year old mark.

The company I worked for was sold to a new owner about 5 years ago. The new owners decided they would rather buy commercially made equipment rather than continue to design and build their own. They also decided to close the design department, assembly department, machine shops, and discontinue support for the in house built equipment. I'm not sure that was a wise decision. In the last few years their stock price has fallen dramatically and the company is downsizing. I would be surprised if the company continues to exist in anything other than a brand name with in the next 5 to 10 years.

Here's an example of a shop built piece of machinery (originally built by the parent company of the company I worked for) that eventually became a tool for assessing mechanical skills. The original machine was designed to wrap bars of soap. It includes levers, slides, cams, springs, and other mechanical components commonly found in many industrial machines. Problems were introduced to the model and the job applicants mechanical skills were tested as far as diagnosing the correcting them. In the end only about the top 15% of the applicants were able to diagnose and correct the problems within the time limit allowed.

Mechanical Skills Assessments - Scientific Management Techniques, Inc.

Mechanical Skills Assessments using the Standard Timing Model (STM) The Standard Timing Model is our mechanical skills assessment tool used to identify mechanical skills and competencies when hiring Maintenance Professionals, Machine Operators, Electro-Mechanical Personnel, Assemblers and...

www.scientific-management.com

The PHD bean counters STRIKE AGAIN. There’s something to be said for privately owned family companies and companies in which managers were only promoted from in house employees who started at the bottom. But they are few and far between.

 

[Superburban]

I worked for 4 big companies at the time when the founder/owner either died, or retired, and passed control to a group of over paid idiots. One was previously listed as one of the 500 top companies to work for (Forbes made the list, I think). All were the same, benefits cut, Promotions were further apart, Staffing was cut (You know, do more with Less, never did find the guy named Less, so I had to take up his slack). Glad I left each one, But also have great memories of when times were good.