Automation

Automation (ancient Greek: = self dictated) or industrial automation is the use of computers to control industrial machinery and processes, replacing human operators. It is a step beyond mechanization, where human operators are provided with machinery to help them with manual work. The most visible part of automation can be said to be industrial robotics. Some advantages are repeatability, tighter quality control, waste reduction, integration with business systems, increased productivity and reduction of labour. Some disadvantages are high initial costs and increased dependence on maintenance.

Current social effects of automation

Currently, for manufacturing companies, the purpose of automation has shifted from increasing productivity and reducing costs to increasing quality and flexibility in the manufacturing process. In the last five years major manufacturing companies have shifted focus due to intensifying competition and difficulties working with a low-level skilled workforce.

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The old focus on using automation to increase productivity and reduce costs is now being exchanged for the new, because companies are having trouble finding a skilled workforce who can make repairs and manage the machinery. Because manufacturing companies could not find and were having difficulty training people to be highly skilled in managing machinery, they stopped focusing on increasing productivity, because it was putting people out of work. They also switched, because with a low supply of people to manage the new equipment it became too costly of a procedure.

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Automation is now applied to increase quality to the manufacturing process, where automation can increase quality substantially. For instance, pistons used to be installed into engines manually. Currently, they are in transition to being installed by machines. This is because the error rate for manual installment was around 1-1.5%, and now it is 0.00001% with automation. They are also implementing automation to operations that may be hazardous to employees, such as casting.

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The other major shift in automation is to increase flexibility and convertibility to the manufacturing process. As stated above, automation was previously used to increase productivity and cost efficiency directly to the manufacturing process. Now, manufacturers are trying instead to increase flexibility (for example, the ability to switch from making Product A to making Product B on the same machines on the same production lines).

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