Comments by "Keit Hammleter" (@keithammleter3824) on "Amazing Production of Nissan GtN Truck door | Ingenious Manufacturing lets's open and check" video.

Ed, just about. And its not even a door - its just the outer skin. Imagine Ford or GM employing old guys to hand panel beat out the defects, as this mob does, when making 300,000 units per year - a typical run that's about 1200 per 8 hour day. Even the floor area required for the panel beaters would cost too much in real estate. It makes you strongly suspect that paying a contract production engineer to re-jig their process would dramatically improve productivity and quality, giving a positive cash flow within a few weeks, even at their very low volume. Someone should replace that squealing worn out drive belt.
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There's often something odd about these Pakistani small shop videos. In this case, it's an old guy using giant tinsnips to cut straight lines in steel sheet. The place clearly has more complex machines - so why don't they have a guillotine? Even a simple hand operated guillotine would considerably improve productivity. Door skins are far below normal quality - just a single colour coat of paint on untreated mild steel - no rustproofing of any kind. Finished door skin shown at end has a clearly visible blemish.
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@nainitalism : Perhaps. But it's certain you do not understand it either. A basic guillotine is not in any way a Volvo or Merc - its a very common basic metalworking tool. I've since watched another video of the same small Pakistani shop, and a guillotine is shown in the background. Perhaps it was broken on the day this video was shot. Or, perhaps some of the workers are too dumb to use it. The economics in any case won't be much different to a Western country. In Pakistan wages are much lower, but materials and tools are also much lower in cost too, so the relative merits of manual labour versus limited automation still stack up. A door that rusts out within a year is going to frustrate a truck owner and cost him in downtime relatively just as much in Pakistan as in any other country. You are totally wrong in claiming the market can't afford original doors. Trucks are made locally in Pakistan by the Hinopak company - they need doors, for a start. Secondly, since Hinopak have been making trucks for 40 years, there must be a substantial market that can afford factory-new trucks. And if any are involved in an accident that ruins a door, at least many of their owners can surely afford a new one. Obviously there must also be a market for shoddy substandard products. That does not mean the products are not shoddy and substandard, nor does it mean that the buyers are not ripping themselves off.
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@dougbaker9473 : First, I told you they are not complete doors, and second, what on earth makes you think it is rust proofing? Go back and watch it again - he loaded the paint gun out (8:59) of a tin clearly marked "High Gloss Enamel."
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@lorna blewett and lee : Landrovers are hardly a much of a standard of comparison as far as dents and other defects are concerned. They are notorious for arriving at dealers with defects. However, if you buy a new Landrover and it's got a dent in it, a complaint to the dealer and he'll have it fixed at no cost to you. I wonder if that will work with these Pakistani-made doors? I've never seen poor welds on a Landrover though - had a few as company vehicles. I went to pick up a brand new one from the dealer once. I refused to take it as it had about a 12 degree list. The factory had fitted wrong springs on one side!
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@bebertdattagre9280 : That old nonsense argument has been regurgitated ever since the industrial revolution began in England 200 years ago. It's never turned out right. As for robots - robots have been used in car body production in western countries for over 40 years. What has been the result? As a fraction of yearly salaries, you get a lot more car, a far better car, for much less of your salary. Here in Australia, in 1965 average wage was about $2500 and a car cost $2000. Today average wage is about $120,000 and cars cost ~ $40,000. So we have a lot more money left over to buy a whole house full of consumer goods - stereos, breadmakers, microwave ovens, high definition TV's, etc - so while a lot less folk work in car factories now, vastly more people work making products nobody had heard of before robots. In another Pakistani video, they show the production of hand-made cement mixers. They posted the price - it happens to be approximately the same as an equivalent capacity cement mixer retail price here in Australia, even though wages here are huge compared to in Pakistan. That's why Australia is rich compared to Pakistan - automated production. Factory automation lowers prices - better affordability - money goes further - everyone benefits and employment remains. Back in teh 1970's people were predicting the coming availability of cheap computers and numerical controlled machines would either lead to drastically reduced work hours or widespread employment. Neither happened.
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@bebertdattagre9280 : Where did you get your figures from? I suspect you did not read your source properly. The average salary (2021 data) for Australian males is $120,943/year; for females it is $102,965. The average personal income is about $60,000 - this includes people on unemployment benefit (which is only ~$16,000/year - below the poverty line, and about what I spend on food), disability pensions, and default age pensions ($23,155/year). We have considerable numbers on the default age pension. I retired 15 years ago as a full time senior professional engineer due to age. My salary at that time was $150,000/year. I only work part time now as a consultant, and still, due to inflation, earn about $150,000/year. Many trades people earn quite a bit more as there is a shortage of trades people. I don't know much about France, but in Australia (population about 25 million), unemployment usually runs at, and still is, about 4 to 5%. There is however a significant underemployment problem - that is quite a few people are not working in jobs that their qualifications should lead to. Never the less, average salary here is still around $120,000/year as I said. We also lost our car manufacturing, due a combination of Chinese and Korean competition and government meddling, but it made hardly a blip on unemployment statistics - jobs in other industries were created. Note that I was quoting in Australian dollars. The US dollar is worth quite a bit more. You have confused two very different factors: a) automation/use of robots, and b) transfer of manufacturing to cheaper countries. Automation improves productivity and creates wealth and thus jobs. But transfer of manufacturing to lower cost countries is having a serious impact on western counties. This is in almost all cases not due to these cheaper countries using automation or robots, as western counties have been using automation & robots in major industries for decades. It is due to several other factors, e.g.:- # The USA have priced themselves out of business by over-the-top regulations about safety and pollution; # The low cost countries generally don't worry about safety; # We for example work an 8-hour day in Australia. In China they work a 12 hour day. # The low cost countries find ways to support industry, such as low tax special regions; # Countries such as the US, Australia, UK, sometimes inject subsidies when they detect a problem, then the them away again. The low cost countries generally decide on a policy and STICK to it.
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@oo0Spyder0oo : Your points on robots are completely valid. Re salaries of who you know, it depends on who you are and who you know. All my friends except one are professionals, and no professional would be on less than $150K/year. Most engineers would be well over. The one that isn't is a police sergeant - a sergeant's salary is about $101k/year, but he gets a lot of overtime and special allowances. But my wife was an office manager (typing/filing/admin) - allowing for inflation (she retired) she would get about $75K/year. My mother (long retired now) was a hotel counter lunch cook - they get $60K/year. All her friends in the hotel industry would be similar. Since my wife died, I acquired a girl friend who is a registered nurse with extensive experience and special endorsements. She gets $97K/year and works a 4-day week. Entry salary for RN's just qualified is $74K/year. My wife's chemo oncologist was in the paper recently - an announcement that she was appointed by a government hospital at $440k/year - and she sees private patients and thus gets additional income. She works darn hard though. School teachers are about the lowest paid folk with uni degrees. According to the South Aust Educ Department website, an experienced ordinary teacher only gets $106K/year. It's well known that low salaries is why schools have difficulty getting and keeping good teachers. All this data is before tax. I was buying some bread the other day from a local bread & cake shop. It's owned by a husband and wife, and they have 7 or 8 part time employees. I got talking to her and she moaned that her car broke down. I asked what her car was - it was BMW 5-series. The bread and cake business must pay well - I can't afford a BMW 5-series. A lot of professionals would be like me: One you get to a salary level of $150K/year, your daily living costs are covered and you have money left over to invest (the 3 basic types being shares, real estate, and interest paying schemes). So our actual income ends up being well over what our day-job salaries are.
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