Re:A Novel Mechanical Ventilator Designed for Mass Scale Pro...
by Mvandenbergh on Wednesday March 25, 2020 @05:16AM
(#22683050)
Shampoo bottles make little sense to make in China. The processes are highly automated, the feedstock is cheaper in the US (way more petrochemical inputs and cheaper energy) and it would be madness to ship empty shampoo bottles over long distances.
Re:A Novel Mechanical Ventilator Designed for Mass Scale Pro...
by double0jimb0 on Wednesday March 25, 2020 @11:56AM
(#22685775)
True on high volume plastic bottles, caps, etc. Those must be manufactured geographically near final distribution, too expensive to ship billions of empty plastic bottles half way around world.
And lots of the tooling for this high volume plastic bottles, lids, etc is made in Germany. Consensus is Germans make best tools for this volume (100’s of millions of parts per year)
Re:A Novel Mechanical Ventilator Designed for Mass Scale Pro...
by kube-system on Wednesday March 25, 2020 @11:47AM
(#22685676)
Even US industrials like the metals industry is still chugging along, and some of it even ends up in Chinese products. It's just that the US has shifted to making more specialized metals and alloys, rather than cheap and basic metals.
- For products containing electronics: short of the electrical components themselves, there is a healthy amount of US electronics+mechanical manufacturing, but it's more geared for lower-volume higher-margin type stuff (think for energy / agriculture / etc.)
- IIRC having spoken to someone at Jabil a few years ago, vague recollection of being told that the US is the largest manufacturer of high volume plastic goods (as well as other products using automated processes). Not so much enclosures for consumer electronics, but rather stuff like shampoo bottles, and that sort of tooling is done here in the US.
- Just keep in mind that manufacturing has a broader scope than what it seems you're implying. Not all manufactured goods involve electronics or injection molding.