Maddalon+Chapter+17

The Assembly Line

The assembly line was a major jump forward in the process of manufacturing. The assembly line was created by Henry Ford, who used it to build one of the first mass produced automobiles, the ford Model T. Ford had experience in building motor cars, but the Ford model T was really the first car model to take off in wide spread popularity. The Ford model T was a cheap and tough car, but it didn't have many add ons or extravagances, and all of the cars were build the same, even the same color. This is due to the need for cheap car, that could easily be mass produced. But it was still too expensive for widespread sale, so Ford needed a way to manufacture the cars cheaper. After building a new factory, and creating and incorporating many ideas for the assembly line, the first assembly line in manufacturing was created on December 1, 1913. The assembly line broke down the creation of the car into a matter of steps, and every one spot along the assembly line was based towards completing one step. Every single car had interchangeable parts, and each was built exactly the same, otherwise the process wouldn't work. The parts were mass produced, then moved to the factory. The cars themselves were produced much quicker, as workers would only work one spot in the line, and could thus focus on that one part of the build process, resulting in much faster building of the cars. The result was a dramatic increase in production, and thus a drop in price, allowing for large scale sale of the car. The larger scale sale of the car resulted in more money to pay the workers and due to the speed of the build process, smaller shifts. However working an assembly line is very monotonous work for the workers. Since the creation of the assembly line, it has been adapted for many other manufacturing processes. It is still in use today due to the ease of manufacturing, and its success in the economy.

Works Cited Goss, Jennifer L. "Henry Ford and the Assembly Line." //about education//. N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Nov. 2015. .