What happens when 200 rocket scientists build a car...

[mallrat]

I'd be happy if they could handle making stuff slightly better laid out, rather than slightly worse, each year. The example that springs to my mind is the large cable harness going from the battery box area to the starter area passing way too close to the transmission fluid check plug on late model semi-trucks. Used to cross the framerail about a foot further back, one year they decided to move it forward so that it passed within an inch of the check plug making it a real pain for anyone trying to perform maintenance. Still plenty of room in the previous location, nothing in the way to cause the change, the engineers just know they'll never have to work on it so they may as well jerk around the consumer. Many other examples, that's just the one that popped up in my head.

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by bryn

i think the 3 jokers on the show top gear built a caterham super 7 in about 8 hours, and it had head lights.

Knowing how the Top Gear crew has worked in the past, they probably had a crew of off-set mechanics doing the actual assembly (probably over many weeks), with pauses for the stars to be filmed at appropriate places. Then the film was edited into another Top Gear fake.

[wdb]

Originally Posted by XYZ

The quoted article reveals what the engineering staff at Lockheed did:

Oog, agile business practices. We've been infected with them at my company. Before they arrived, we had our total time for a particular deliverable down to just under 2 days. Now that we're becoming 'agile', it's up to 2 weeks, and heading towards 2 months.

I've seen a lot of executive-driven 'work smarter' silliness ooze down over the working ranks in my not-inconsiderable years in corporate America; 'agile practices' takes the cake.

[Cobb]

FAIL, the car isnt cylinder shape, nor does it have any fins or travels in a vertical manner exceeding the speed of sound by several factors.

[XYZ]

Originally Posted by mallrat

I'd be happy if they could handle making stuff slightly better laid out, rather than slightly worse, each year. The example that springs to my mind is the large cable harness going from the battery box area to the starter area passing way too close to the transmission fluid check plug on late model semi-trucks. Used to cross the framerail about a foot further back, one year they decided to move it forward so that it passed within an inch of the check plug making it a real pain for anyone trying to perform maintenance. Still plenty of room in the previous location, nothing in the way to cause the change, the engineers just know they'll never have to work on it so they may as well jerk around the consumer. Many other examples, that's just the one that popped up in my head.

Someone benefited from the decision to change that design.

Now let us ask ourselves who benefited, or how they benefited from changing it.

Who pays? Who benefits?

[XYZ]

Originally Posted by Old Tele man

Yup, that's when the:

"...mule is a committee-designed horse..."

turns into a:

"...the committee horse is a mule-(screwed)-design..."

But the committee designed a horse that acts differently than a horse, or actually it is a quasi-horse that is not so easily dominated.

(As I'm sure you already know ) a horse will work until he drops. But a mule can and will refuse to work if he doesn't want to.

[botsapper]

Car design is more an art than science.
When the early auto sales (primarily Model T) reached market saturation, GM turned to yearly design changes to maintain the sales momentum. This marketing device conditioned the American buying public to 'planned obsolescence'. They turned to early industrial designers and created in-house styling departments for their yearly restyling. In Europe however, the automobile was steeped in the coach building tradition; reliability, precision, luxury and aesthetics. Interestingly, they aesthetically developed along their nationalistic identities and cultural flair.

Most 'successful' designs have been strong & singular visions by a director/designer. They are able to 'package' all aspects of innovations in engine/chassis/production engineering and interior/exterior aesthetics.

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by XYZ

(As I'm sure you already know ) a horse will work until he drops.

Don't know who told you that, but it ain't true of all horses. Not my mare, anyway. She gets tired, she lets you know it.

[mallrat]

Originally Posted by XYZ

Someone benefited from the decision to change that design.

Now let us ask ourselves who benefited, or how they benefited from changing it.

Who pays? Who benefits?

The engineers benefit because they like defecating on the service department. The customer pays because routine maintenance becomes more of a pain in the butt and takes longer.

[Frank Lee]

The Engineering Dept. I worked in didn't necessarily set out to defecate on Service people but the majority of those "engineers" didn't and probably had never so much as changed the oil in their vehicles. The reasons serviceability is so much worse than it could be are that the "engineers" don't have a clue and the managers never make it a design criteria. If it can be slapped together on the assembly line that's about as far as they care about it.

I also found that the term "engineer" gets thrown around quite loosely, as in, some of those guys were so dumb they couldn't McGuyver their way out of a wet paper bag.