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Horrors of their first budget.

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    Originally posted by vetran View Post

    Mass production i.e. 10s of thousands to millions of products you need moulds or custom machines.

    CNC is great for custom jobs there is plenty of work going on creating custom cutting boards, mugs on mass produced products bought from China.

    In the UK my ex employer still assembles custom jobs from sub assemblies and decals, they just do it in a centralised assembly shop. Customers can still order a short run of customised units. But normally if they want 50,000 units they have to wait until the custom units are shipped from Africa. A hybrid fulfillment solution may also work.
    Depends on the product, look at the gun industry in the US, heaps and heaps of CNC machines churning parts day and night. Also don't forget, moulds cost a ton of money, if you want to customise the product, you then need another mould and you've lost money on the first one.

    Comment


      Originally posted by vetran View Post

      Businesses & employees that pay tax in the UK.
      As in they are all going to leave suddenly? and move where now that a British passport needs a visa pretty much anywhere? whoever wanted to leave, left before / after Brexit, the rest are stuck in this tuliphole forever.

      Comment


        On the subject of automation. The Japanese baby boom started 20 years before ours, so their population peeked earlier. Manfacturing was huge in Japan which is why they were so wealthy and powerful up to the 80s. But their country is far more politically unified than the UK, they basically have 1 party in power for long periods of time, and near zero immigration. This meant that they could implement long term plans as their working population peaked in size, and they automated massively. The Seiko watch I am wearing is one of something like 30,000 made every day on a production line that it close to 100% automated for example. Amazing what you can do when you have the money, brains, and dedication to doing it, but above all the political unity that enables a country to keep going after the same idea for long stretches of time.

        There are a lot of similarities with the UK and Germany, in terms of our demographics to what happened to Japan 20 or 30 years ago. We still have wealth, and brains. Somehow I just cannot see us having the ability to keep our tulip together politically in the same way. For one thing, we seem to be going down the path of immigration to fill out the demographics.

        Comment


          Originally posted by dsc View Post

          Depends on the product, look at the gun industry in the US, heaps and heaps of CNC machines churning parts day and night. Also don't forget, moulds cost a ton of money, if you want to customise the product, you then need another mould and you've lost money on the first one.
          CNC customising wood / plastic stocks maybe, but for metal barrel or moving parts its likely they will be cast and machined in volume. The tolerances on barrels are very exact.

          For a plastic stock then they will be cast and maybe engraved via CNC.

          even a modern CNC can take ages so for volume it is not great.

          The completely CNC created gun is being used to avoid legal oversight which is not really going to make it the backbone of industry.

          A 3d printed low volume mold can cost $100 a conventional machined metal one a few thousand $ and can then create thousands or millions of parts. Its been a while since I cast and machined metal but it is hardly fast using cnc will probably speed it up and make it cheaper.

          The machine $50,000.

          good guide here:

          https://formlabs.com/uk/blog/injecti...SCu5FNtfoauShA

          Comment


            Originally posted by vetran View Post
            In the UK my ex employer still assembles custom jobs from sub assemblies and decals,.
            were you EVER a contractor??

            Comment


              Originally posted by sadkingbilly View Post

              were you EVER a contractor??
              Yes I was a contractor over a number of years I had 4 clients (mainly concurrent) and a few subcontractors. Of course being outside IR35 I was an employee of my limited then as well.

              My largest end client on-shored our (multiple contractors) function with an Indian outsourcer to pay less in India having an Indian subsidiary, this made sure they paid little tax in the UK. This drives my dislike of the UK's flawed visa based workers policy.

              Shortly after this change while I was looking for another major contract the country manager of this employer phoned me up and offered me a job with great pay and challenges (we had worked together previously).

              I was taking over from one of the big 5 and hiring a team to provide a better service. I stayed there for nearly two decades. Ironically as I left they offshored some of my work to Germany and the rest to India. Apparently the service worsened.

              As an employed IT manager I managed multiple sites (sales, service and manufacturing) and people internationally. I also advised other sites on their systems, data and IT hence the varied experience. Frequently the systems used for manufacturing were wild cards that needed properly managing to be safe on the network.

              Yes when I was a contractor I smoked.

              Comment


                Originally posted by vetran View Post

                CNC customising wood / plastic stocks maybe, but for metal barrel or moving parts its likely they will be cast and machined in volume. The tolerances on barrels are very exact.

                For a plastic stock then they will be cast and maybe engraved via CNC.

                even a modern CNC can take ages so for volume it is not great.

                The completely CNC created gun is being used to avoid legal oversight which is not really going to make it the backbone of industry.

                A 3d printed low volume mold can cost $100 a conventional machined metal one a few thousand $ and can then create thousands or millions of parts. Its been a while since I cast and machined metal but it is hardly fast using cnc will probably speed it up and make it cheaper.

                The machine $50,000.

                good guide here:

                https://formlabs.com/uk/blog/injecti...SCu5FNtfoauShA
                You can CNC machine barrels if you like as well, but there's heaps of parts in the fire control group / bolt etc. that can and are CNC machine. Just see here:

                https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoK3Po1mfy8

                Moulds have their place, but for precision stuff CNCs win hands down. The issue is of course cost, modern machining centers are crazy money, so you really need to have a massive order intake to purchase them and I'm not so sure it's very cost effective in the UK.

                Comment


                  Originally posted by vetran View Post

                  Yes I was a contractor over a number of years I had 4 clients (mainly concurrent) and a few subcontractors. Of course being outside IR35 I was an employee of my limited then as well.

                  My largest end client on-shored our (multiple contractors) function with an Indian outsourcer to pay less in India having an Indian subsidiary, this made sure they paid little tax in the UK. This drives my dislike of the UK's flawed visa based workers policy.

                  Shortly after this change while I was looking for another major contract the country manager of this employer phoned me up and offered me a job with great pay and challenges (we had worked together previously).

                  I was taking over from one of the big 5 and hiring a team to provide a better service. I stayed there for nearly two decades. Ironically as I left they offshored some of my work to Germany and the rest to India. Apparently the service worsened.

                  As an employed IT manager I managed multiple sites (sales, service and manufacturing) and people internationally. I also advised other sites on their systems, data and IT hence the varied experience. Frequently the systems used for manufacturing were wild cards that needed properly managing to be safe on the network.

                  Yes when I was a contractor I smoked.
                  so 30, 40 years ago?

                  Comment


                    Originally posted by sadkingbilly View Post

                    so 30, 40 years ago?
                    no

                    Comment


                      Originally posted by vetran View Post

                      no
                      so - permy for two decades before current perm stint of ? 10years? to date. = 30 years ago.
                      (sorry, you sound like some kind of '#manager', so technical stuff like arithmetic WILL be beyond your feeble little ganglion.

                      Comment

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