Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

washingtonpost.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

441–450 of 753 posts

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#441

Post by kenhwang »

red-iron-pine wrote: post #378
kenhwang wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even non-EVs have gotten quite a bit heavier due to the inclusion of more structural safety features and creature comforts.

arguably the biggest driver is simply the cost of oil. crumple zones made of styrofoam and plastic bumpers arn't making things heavy. e.g. https://www.forbes.com/sites/samabuelsamid/2019/01/03/new-ve...

That article is being disingenuous and wrong. It's comparing the lightest possible Civic configuration with the heaviest possible Accord of a different body type.

The 2000 Accord sedan is 2,712lbs, not 2,987lbs (which would be the wagon).

The 2019 Civic sedan is 2,743–2,923lbs depending on equipment/trim.

So yes, the Civic compared to an older car of similar size did get heavier.

The Miata proves that cars don't have to be heavier, but the Miata also took advantage of much more aluminum compared to the older models. Maybe mainstream cars should also switch to use more aluminum to keep weight down, and you're right that the reason they don't is because oil is cheap enough where weight isn't a priority enough to use more expensive aluminum instead of steel.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#442

Post by Der_Einzige »

nradov wrote: post #390
baq wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

India will gladly accept those factories for a few decades.

If that's true then why hasn't India changed government policy to make it a more attractive location for manufacturing?

Because of socialism, go look at how its two socialist (and most industrial states) treat capital investment!

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#443

Post by beeflet »

saubeidl wrote: post #208
nxm wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EU regs will ensure that never happens

EU regs will ensure that happens. They are a power projection tool. We've bent Apple to our will, we've made the whole world follow GDPR.

The world will bow down to mandatory cookie banners

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#444

Post by jeffreygoesto »

dunham wrote: post #415
minkeymaniac wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes.. try moving that 36 inch Sony Trinitron from the car inside the house.. weighs 200 pounds+ IIRC....you need at least 2 strong people

I remember the Sun monitors (21" I think) were about 80 lbs. I've read that part of that was a metal frame to hold all of the wires in front of the screen. They were fun monitors - we had a lab full of them, they would degauss on startup, and the degausser would induct into the monitor next to it (and a little bit into the monitor after that).

Right. Bought two out of a University lab and lived in an apartment six stories high with only stairs. Moved out those monitors even and they were more difficult to get down than the couch...

Don't let me get started about fixed frequency, X11 modeline guessing (wrong of course) and needing a second monitor to even get back to the original config.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#445

Post by varjag »

Thlom wrote: post #368
varjag wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The leadership in democracy does what the population wants, even more so in the past couple decades.

Yet somehow the desires of the population is fulfilled to a higher degree in authoritarian China than in the beacon of democracy USA.

This uh valiant defense of China misses my point entirely. People in democracies have no excuse hiding their personal responsibility behind flawed leadership.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#446

Post by zevon »

roenxi wrote: post #240
nvader wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not arguing with your overall conclusion. However, the hardware situation you described sounds very brittle to me. If the machine shop is so tightly constrained and error-phobic, that sounds like there's very little space of tinkering, exploration or innovation. Unless that was your overall point, that capacity in hardware manufacturing has rotted away to the point where things are hanging on by a thread.

> However, the hardware situation you described sounds very brittle to me. If the machine shop is so tightly constrained and error-phobic, that sounds like there's very little space of tinkering, exploration or innovation. The technical term for that is "the real world". Moment of perspective on just how weird the software people are that they don't just accept mucking around as expensive and dangerous.

That sounds catchy but I think it doesn't survive further inspection. People mucking around with machines and processes were rather instrumental in creating lathes, steam power, rockets, computers, looms, software, CNC-machines and all those other puzzle pieces we have available to make stuff. They are also instrumental in developing those things further.

I'm also kind of curious as to know what kind of machine shops you base this on. Most production companies, labs and even small fabricators I've seen have continued to develop and to optimize their infrastructure and processes. To take the numbers discussed here: 50 years ago, (C)NC machines, CAD and CAM were in their infancy. And that stuff certainly has changed some things in the world of fabrication.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#447

Post by wslh »

chii wrote: post #440
tclancy wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a really interesting generation gap issue in the replies to your comment. What I perceive as younger people are horrified at the idea of fifty year old tools while the older folks are thinking (I imagine) “if the tools have lasted that long they must be well-honed and very good”. Of course, this could simply be the perspective of someone turning 50 this year.

The thing is, those 50 yr old machine tools might be still good, but the more recent CNC machines are much more efficient, and require way less manual dexterity to use (say, compared to a lathe). This is the whole idea of industrialization - moving away from having skilled artisans, into machines that encode the skill to reproduce the article. The fact that machines that are 50 yrs old are still in operation is quite…

I think it is not always about an age gap. A friend has a distribution company with many trucks and many times they need to use a manual machine, and soldering for fixing truck issues.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#448

Post by greedo »

zbentley wrote: post #271
DannyBee wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"If the machine shop is so tightly constrained and error-phobic, that sounds like there's very little space of tinkering, exploration or innovation." This is the opposite of brittle. You say this as if those things are desired here. Those things would be a net negative to a well known production process for complex parts. After years, that process has been refined to basically the limits of the machines and the physi…

> not everything requires improvement or tinkering. Some things are just done. For sure, but how do you know? If it's only via: > The experimental part is done until a new machine might provide some benefit (Often this is done by the manufacturer trying to sell them). Then you would test it out on that machine, not fuck up an existing well-running process. ...then I worry about the efficiency of improvement. Sure, ma…

Improvement is usually done via competition. Sometimes the competition is price based, and sometimes quality based. In the best of worlds, both.

For example, there are a ton of cheap crappy woodworking tools. Think Stanley etc. They barely do the job if at all. Then there are a group of vendors like Wood River that constantly create newer tools that are much more expensive than what you find in a big box tool store. And then farther up the food chain are vendors like Lie Nielsen who craft luxury tools that are amazing to use.

This market segmentation extends to most tools; someone like Woodpecker comes up with a ton of clever tools for marking/measuring etc for woodworking, then others copy them. Oldest story in capitalism.

The manufacturing improvements in this process are non-stop. For some really good examples in consumer electronics, read "Apple in China" to see how China transformed into a power house in a relatively short amount of time.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#449

Post by mikewarot »

dunham wrote: post #415
minkeymaniac wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes.. try moving that 36 inch Sony Trinitron from the car inside the house.. weighs 200 pounds+ IIRC....you need at least 2 strong people

I remember the Sun monitors (21" I think) were about 80 lbs. I've read that part of that was a metal frame to hold all of the wires in front of the screen. They were fun monitors - we had a lab full of them, they would degauss on startup, and the degausser would induct into the monitor next to it (and a little bit into the monitor after that).

The weight from a CRT is mostly about the amount of glass required to keep the atmosphere out, as it's essentially a vacuum bottle with better marketing. On that 21" display, you've got about 6000 pounds of force trying to push the face inward, not to mention the sides, neck, etc.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#450

Post by hombre_fatal »

shawn_w wrote: post #157
ryandrake wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know why people romanticize 1950-style manufacturing jobs so much, like they are some kind of objectively ideal job. These jobs really weren't great. Bunch of dudes standing at an assembly line all day physically busting their asses and sweating it out. Sometimes in a physically hazardous environment. Sometimes breathing stinky and/or harmful chemicals. Sometimes surrounded by ear-damaging loud noises. Someti…

Back then a couple could buy a house and raise a few kids on the paycheck that factory job of the husband's earned. These days even someone with a 6 figure tech job has trouble with that goal, but I think a lot of people think they can go back to the good old days.

They don't realize that making good money in a factory was due to a particular tech/economic environment and the US' position inside it.

People thinking they can go back to making good money in a widget factory is like thinking because you had an ascendant economy in 1836 exporting wood before global electrification, then that lucrative job is always waiting for you even in 2025.

Post reply on HN