History of Precision Machining
For a more holistic picture, including the history of mechanic automation see
THE DEVELOPMENT AND USE OF MACHINE TOOLS IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE
Carlsson, Bo. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization 5, no. 1 (1984): 91-114
Notes
- p4. increasing importance of flexibility at the expense of scale economies in production - this appears to be an artifact of extreme productivity. Any machine will overproduce, crash markets, and destroy nature, thus the challenge becomes one of how an expensive machine can be made more flexible, in the sense of Flexible Fabrication. See The Second Industrial Divide.
- and the shifting emphasis from development of individual pieces of machinery to integration and control of entire manufacturing processes, i.e., the increased need for a systems approach
