Designed Obsolescence and Minimising Cost

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• Designed
• Obsolescence
• and
• Minimising
• Cost

[CosmicDramaQueen]

I bless my 25 year old appliances everyday :) No Kidding!

[gadzometer]

@CosmicDramaQueen What? You don't miss the flashing LED's and digital clock in the side of them? :P

[alanstarkie2001]

Modern industry is geared to keep down costs - profits are one reason but we now have the 'green' excuse. It could be argued that making a bridge out of 20% fewer materials is good for the environment and saves carbon credits or whatever those things are! Nice to see you again.

[gadzometer]

@alanstarkie2001 Good to hear from you too Alan. I don't think I was very clear in the video. The point I am making is that that same bridge is designed to last 50 years. The bridge will need to be replaced or rebuilt and the contractors usually have this scheduled. Most of them will also try to win the maintenance contract to ensure an income stream during this time. Building materials like steel, asphalt and concrete are mixed to a certain standard to last that long but could last longer.

[alanstarkie2001]

@gadzometer short-termism. Sorry about this 'isms'. Those guys will be dead and buried long before rebuilding is even thought about. I like the idea of over engineering things - for example Victorian structures and 1970s Nikon cameras. Over engineering often happened when there was some uncertainty about durability so they just went 'over the top' in the application. These days complex modeling allows them to shave off to a safe minimum and save dollars (this years budget) ~ short termism.

[gadzometer]

@alanstarkie2001 Well put. Technologies tend to change rapidly so a longer term bridge may not be the optimal design for 50 years in the future. BTW have you seen the new zeitgeist movie yet? Release a couple of days ago.

[ericfsugolf77]

Very true...it seems like the cost of production will always seem to outweigh designing a higher quality product...I was thinking about that today in one of my classes...one of the variables that can be controlled is the safety factor...drop the safety standards, and the cost of production goes down...it seems like there's little incentive to design for much more durability/quality than the minimum required

[darrylsloan]

@alanstarkie2001 Cheers, Alan. I don't have one, but I definitely appreciate the offer.

[gadzometer]

@Neanderthalcouzin My kids woke me up and went back to sleep but I couldn't. :)

Yeah the one thing that I haven't heard much about it the political/administration/law aspects. I tried to address that in my last video but it still needs a lot of work.

[alanstarkie2001]

@darrylsloan Darryl, if you have any iPods that need new batteries send them to me! I know how to change them. Li-Ion batteries are superior to NiCad, take up less space thus you can make a smaller more economical (greener) product. I like Apple because their products are designed to last - and they generally do, even though I have had the odd run-in with Apple! I blame consumerism - folks want new things all the time - why over engineer? I like fixing things - that's why I'm a service engineer!