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Journal Editorial + CVu Journal Vol 30, #4 - September 2018
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Title: Editorial: Precision Engineered

Author: Bob Schmidt

Date: 10 September 2018 22:10:11 +01:00 or Mon, 10 September 2018 22:10:11 +01:00

Summary: 

Body: 

I was recently watching a TV program about re-conditioning and repairing old, valuable and much-loved items. In one episode, a badly damaged chair is brought to the workshop, and it’s in a very sorry state. It’s made partly of wood, and broken into two pieces.

The chair is a much sought-after item, and is a very elegant, cleverly designed piece of furniture. Each component part is made from the finest, most exclusive materials of the time, precision-engineered by expert craftspeople, all brought together to make more than just a very nice chair: it’s a piece of art, and a fine example of design engineering.

But now, it’s broken and unusable. The problem appears to have been caused by a previous repair to an arm mounting. The failure of this component whilst the chair was being used normally caused a catastrophic fault in the chair’s wooden back support, which has snapped irreparably. Stresses in one small, but faulty, part of the chair finally caused another part of the chair to reach breaking point.

To compound the problems, the broken back support is made from a type of wood that is no longer available to buy. To make the chair functional again, it must be replaced, as it cannot be repaired, and so a different type of wood has to be used. A replacement wooden back is found, and although the colour isn’t quite an exact match, it’s at least as strong, of a similar style, and judged good enough.

The chair is finally back in one piece, but it’s taken a large amount of time and effort, and the end result isn’t exactly like the chair as it was initially designed. The original makers never foresaw that the exclusive materials they used might not be available in the future, and didn’t anticipate that a slight defect in one component could have such serious consequences.

Does any of this sound familiar to anyone else?

Notes: 

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