How Everyday Things Are Made

OckNock writes "The Alliance for Innovative Manufacturing at Stanford University in conjunction with Design4x has released online courses on design and manufacturing that include over 4 hours of streaming video (Flashplayer required). Some of the topics include airplanes, crayons, and waterjet cutting. If only they had this when I had studied mechanical engineering - maybe I would have stayed awake in class more."

Comments

Take a look at

[AchmedHabib]

Take a look at http://www.howstuffworks.com/. There's a lot of explanations for just about anything.

Re:great stuff!

[PurpleFloyd]

Sorry, but process engineering is a dead field right now. Many companies are cutting "improvement" departments like process engineering and IT to the bone because they don't directly produce end products; middle and upper management often look down on divisions that don't do "real work." While companies doing this are essentially shooting themselves in the foot, most of manufacturing is cutting back or eliminating entirely divisions that serve to improve productivity. Since they're not directly related to product output, they get cut first and the company doesn't suffer immediately.

Also, what makes you think that an out-of-work sysadmin or programmer would be qualified? All the process engineers I know have spent many years working on the shop floor in their industries, and know the processes involved like the back of their hand. If they can't find work, what hope is there for someone who walks in from what is essentially a completely different industry?

Re:Just on time!

[ruprechtjones]

"I am gonna become a World-Class Crayon maker."

Just watch out for such innovative naming conventions as "Flesh" and "Indian Red"...

It is introductory.

[Anonymous Coward]

Which means interesting and undestandable by anyone without specific prior knowledge. Their disclaimer says (with highlights added):
AIM has developed an introductory website showing how various items are made. It covers over 40 different products and manufacturing processes, and includes almost 4 hours of manufacturing video. It is targeted towards non-engineers and engineers alike. Think of it as your own private online factory tour, or a virtual factory tour, if you wish. We are able to cover only a small number of products and processes, but we believe it will give you a good introduction to the world of manufacturing.

Re:Mr. Wizard

[ruprechtjones]

If you saw Bill Nye's original work on "Almost Live", a local Seattle comedy show that had its heyday in the early nineties, you would actually dig him. To me, he went to shit when he was picked up by Disney, but so be it. I still have some props from his studio (a killer 5-foot paper-mache T-Rex foot, I think it was used for prints in the sand, whatever, it's cool hanging on my wall), even tho I stopped watching him on cable, I still respect the dude. Like most other 'mericans, he followed the money, and hopefully he's doing alright now.

Re:Ah, the memories

[MikeD83]

Yes, I remember an episode where they went to a pencil factory. The interesting part was that all the waste wood was ground down and combined with glue to form a Duraflame faux fireplace log.

Re:this is college level?

[Hal-9001]

You're thinking of a physics for non-majors course at the University of Virginia. The instructor, Louis Bloomfield (author of How Things Work: The Physics of Everyday Life), used a program to check the final papers for that course for plagarism, and came up with a disturbing number of positive results.

Re:still need to replace more people with machines

[Cyno01]

I'm in milwaukee right now watching the Harley 100 aniverssary parade on tv right now. A bit of history, Harleys used to be manufactured by assembly line, but their quality declined so much that the company almost went under, it changed hands a few times, and was eventually bought by the employees. Now the bikes are hand assembled by four man teams.