technology in manufacturing

Manfacturing involves processes that are carried out to create a finished product from raw materials. The process of manufacturing is a system. These systems are split into 3 parts: input, process and output.

Input - materials, tools and equipment that you start off with

Process - what happens to the input to change it into an output (measuring, cutting etc.)

Output - result of the system (finished product)

Automation is us in machines to do tasks automatically with human input. It has been a key development in manufacturing and is present in many factories. It can be sued to carry out processes or manufacture products.

Advantages:

increase the speed of production (cheaper than humans)

High accuracy and consistency while humans make costly, time-wasting mistakes (increase quality of products)

Robots can be used where it would be unsafe for humans (welding)

Disadvantages:

replace human workers (fewer jobs)

Very expensive to buy

Can’t carry out tasks where human judgement is required