A man roughly sketched a special machine. His idea
was worked out and the machine built. Now four men have several times
the output of the seventeen men--and have no hard work at all to do.
Changing from a solid to a welded rod in one part of the chassis
effected an immediate saving of about one half million a year on a
smaller than the present-day production. Making certain tubes out of
flat sheets instead of drawing them in the usual way effected another
enormous saving.
The old method of making a certain gear comprised four operations and 12
per cent. of the steel went into scrap. We use most of our scrap and
eventually we will use it all, but that is no reason for not cutting
down on scrap--the mere fact that all waste is not a dead loss is no
excuse for permitting waste. One of the workmen devised a very simple
new method for making this gear in which the scrap was only one per
cent. Again, the camshaft has to have heat treatment in order to make
the surface hard; the cam shafts always came out of the heat-treat oven
somewhat warped, and even back in 1918, we employed 37 men just to
straighten the shafts.
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