Assembly lines are a “manufacturing technique in which a product is carried by some form of conveyor among stations where various operations are performed” (Columbia Encyclopedia). This extraordinary idea was one of the greatest things to come out of the Second Industrial Revolution which spanned from 1870 to 1914 (Mokyr, p.1). Assembly lines made our world the way it is today, adding overall convenience to buying. Today, stores are able to sell millions of units of product before going out of stock, as opposed to the late 1800s to early 1900s. With the help of assembly lines, stores are able to save money during production, making products less expensive and passing those savings to consumers. In general mass production “raised the standard
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His long lasting legacy still stands strong. Henry Ford used assembly lines for Ford Motor Co. starting in 1913 (Nye, p.254). He revolutionized the way cars were built, once again. In addition, his idea created the inspiration to later on build manufacturing processes for other products. Ford was the first to use a ground breaking “Moving assembly line” (which was similar to what is used today) (History.com). His assembly lines involved the cars being on a mechanically moving platform that is powered by conveyor belts. Workers in each station would have one single task and do that same task on each vehicle as it passed them by. For example, if your job was to assemble the front left wheel, you only assembled the front left wheel, everything else would be done by a different worker. Ford’s most popular vehicle, the “Model T” had 84 steps in its assembly line. With his new moving assembly line, Ford was shooting cars right out of his factory literally fractioning the time it took to build a car; from a whopping twelve hours to a lightning fast two and a half hours. He set new standards for the automobile industry for both time and cost. Fords were cheaper due to lower production costs than its competitors. Henry Ford even further lower the cost of his vehicles by taking advantage of his very lucrative profit margins. This was a perfect thing to do because at the time, cars were really only a thing for the wealthy few, most people still rode horses and carriages. With the car becoming less and less expensive, it quickly became a part of every average person’s life, greatly increasing his market (or targeted
His long lasting legacy still stands strong. Henry Ford used assembly lines for Ford Motor Co. starting in 1913 (Nye, p.254). He revolutionized the way cars were built, once again. In addition, his idea created the inspiration to later on build manufacturing processes for other products. Ford was the first to use a ground breaking “Moving assembly line” (which was similar to what is used today) (History.com). His assembly lines involved the cars being on a mechanically moving platform that is powered by conveyor belts. Workers in each station would have one single task and do that same task on each vehicle as it passed them by. For example, if your job was to assemble the front left wheel, you only assembled the front left wheel, everything else would be done by a different worker. Ford’s most popular vehicle, the “Model T” had 84 steps in its assembly line. With his new moving assembly line, Ford was shooting cars right out of his factory literally fractioning the time it took to build a car; from a whopping twelve hours to a lightning fast two and a half hours. He set new standards for the automobile industry for both time and cost. Fords were cheaper due to lower production costs than its competitors. Henry Ford even further lower the cost of his vehicles by taking advantage of his very lucrative profit margins. This was a perfect thing to do because at the time, cars were really only a thing for the wealthy few, most people still rode horses and carriages. With the car becoming less and less expensive, it quickly became a part of every average person’s life, greatly increasing his market (or targeted