| Electronics > Manufacturing & Assembly |
| Product manufacture in England! :) |
| (1/4) > >> |
| Kibi:
I had such fun today. :) The company that I work for is getting a bespoke product manufactured by a company in England. The manufacturing company has completed the product and invited us down to thier premisis to test the product. They then fed us lunch followed by a tour of their facility. They fab. everything except the boards in house. They design the product, the boards and the enclosures in house and just send the gerbers off to a PCB fab. house down the road. They load and solder the boards in house and then perform through hole soldering by hand. The tour also included a visit to their component stores and the CNC shop where they manufacture the enclosures which includes screen printing of the enclosures. Each product is then tested by hand with a bespoke, in house designed test device to ensure quality. It is very refreshing to see a quality product being designed and manufactured right here in England. :) We don't have to send off to China to get stuff made. |
| IanB:
Sounds fun! I presume this is a small quantity custom design? Hand soldering sounds very labour intensive for larger quantities of product. In the old days there were wave solder machines...I wonder if any are still around? I used to work for a company where we purchased control panels with custom switch and indicator layouts and custom circuits inside them. In those days too we were able to find a local fabricator who could design and manufacture the whole thing. There will always be a market (I hope) for bespoke products like this. |
| Fraser:
Hi, Nice post and I totally agree with supporting British Industry in these hard times. I even buy my groceries locally whenever possible to support local businesses, BUT we can't avoid one awful truth..... British labour and expertise is good but comes at a price. Our wages are normally decent and appropriate for the skill set in our industries, but China can massively undercut the labour and materials costs. A sore subject but I believe Dyson ended up off shoring work to maintain profit margins and economies of production. I would never say Chinese production is better or preferable to UK sourced production but it does make sense when the bean counters look at the business model. A little story for you....some years ago I saw an interview with a Fidelity manager who was discussing the production of a little TV set. He stated that just the TV picture tube cost him GBP12 after import duty as it was an electronic part. He stated that the Korean imported complete TV sets hit the UK market with no import duties as it was a finished product and only cost GBP14 wholesale. His point was that he could not compete with the imports because the cost of production in the UK was just too high and even HMRC were against him doing so ! This story dates back to the 1980's so bear this in mind regarding the figures etc. Things may now have changed but I think the underlying problem is still valid. |
| IanB:
Nowadays I believe the opposite is true. Finished products are subject to import duty, but electronic parts are not (got to check with HMRC to confirm this). This would sort of make sense, as it would favour local manufacture over imported goods. Keep in mind that bulk production is different from bespoke manufacture. If you outsource production to China, I understand you will pretty much have to go and live in China and supervise your baby while they tool up for production or nothing that comes off the production line will work. (They will substitute parts, redesign things for "simplicity", remove "unnecessary" features, and so on.) For small runs, this is going to eat into any cost savings you think you might make. |
| Fraser:
Hi IanB, I am very please to read that all is not as dismal as I had feared. I have seen bespoke production facilities for some specialist items and the price is often not the issue, provided the product meets the spec and timelines. Many thanks for the insight. |
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