1832 Steam Engine

[California98Civic]

Jay Leno's Garage has a good old steam engine and a great segment on remanufacturing a part it needed:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zoBWAE0win0

[Grinder74]

I remember a show where he drives his Stanley Steamer. Cool stuff!

[California98Civic]

Originally Posted by Grinder74

I remember a show where he drives his Stanley Steamer. Cool stuff!

In the clip I linked above there is a great segment making a brass and steel part that had to be replaced. Software and hardware like that woukd be handy for people with rare econoboxes one day!

[Grinder74]

Cnc machining is cool but not necessary. I'm surprised he didn't have them make the parts in a more traditional way. Brass part was probably cast and machined afterward. It was part of the governor, so non stressed parts. I don't like cnc if it's just one part, kind of a waste. An old lathe and bridgeport will do for a ton of jobs, but you have to do more fixturing and setup.
Think about what we have accomplished before computers were in manufacturing, we have airplanes that still fly, car still on the road and the speed records made all without computer modeling and manufacturing.

[freebeard]

And the pyramids were built without benefit of the wheel?

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=jay+leno+restoration+blog

I don't know which episode it was but they manufactured replacement brass waterjackets for some engine. The craftsmanship to do it the original way is no longer available. Or at least economic. I know he mentioned 3D printing a Mercedes dash knob that would have cost $500 OEM.

[California98Civic]

Originally Posted by Grinder74

...
Think about what we have accomplished before computers were in manufacturing, we have airplanes that still fly, car still on the road and the speed records made all without computer modeling and manufacturing.

I do think about it. I wish I knew a tenth of what my grandfather did about making and repairing parts. I still remember his work shop vividly. I think that knowledge such as his has not been lost. It has been digitized. The change to 3d printing and such is historically analogous to how stamping machines replaced skilled knowledge of people who once did that labor. The knowledge was not lost. It was embodied in a machine. What is lost is our connection to the materials and that is sad and profound.

Originally Posted by freebeard

... he mentioned 3D printing a Mercedes dash knob that would have cost $500 OEM.

And maybe here is why we know where even more of the skilled machinists will be going in the future. Printing parts is more profitable for the profit hunting investors and cheaper for the bargain hunting consumers.

I have acquaintances and friends now making money selling big industrial 3D printers. They can not keep them in stock and are month behind filling orders.

In a way, machines like this beautiful 1832 engine represented an earlier stage in this history. After all, these precision engines were replacing water and horse power for wood and iron constructions. Local blacksmiths and carpenters were cut out by those with access to more profitable methods that attracted the bigger capital.

In our A.I. robot future, we might be further from the manufacturing than our ancestors could have imagined.

[freebeard]

The knowledge was not lost. It was embodied in a machine. What is lost is our connection to the materials and that is sad and profound.
....
In our A.I. robot future, we might be further from the manufacturing than our ancestors could have imagined.

Manufacturing Damascus steel was non-trivial.The knowledge domain has shifted, the people who made the steam engine would be lost trying to generate a STL file from G-code.

It's less than 200 years since the first photograph, and photolithography is used to make things invisible to the naked eye. Currently in the 10s of nanometer range.

Originally Posted by Wikipedia

During development, Lathrop and Nall were successful in creating a 2D miniaturized hybrid integrated circuit with transistors using this technique.[3] In 1958, during the IRE Professional Group on Electron Devices (PGED) conference in Washington, D.C., they presented the first paper to describe the fabrication of transistors using photographic techniques and coined the term “photolithography” to describe the process, marking the first published use of the term to describe semiconductor device patterning.

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by freebeard

...3D printing a Mercedes dash knob that would have cost $500 OEM.

But he likely could have gotten an aftermarket knob for $5. Any dealer marks up OEM parts way beyond realistic value, and "prestige" brands like Mercedes & BMW mark them up even further, because their customers generally have money and are willing to pay.

FWIW, I once made a replacement valve for a '54 Sunbeam Alpine by using a lathe to trim a Chevy (IIRC) to fit. And made a few Whitworth nuts & bolts, too - this was long before you could just order them on eBay.