Invention of the Assembly Line

Invention of the Assembly Line

Webster's online dictionary defines an assembly line as a "mechanical system in a factory whereby an article is conveyed through sites at which successive operations are performed on it."

An assembly line is used to assemble quickly large numbers of a uniform product. (Webster's Online Dictionary)

Eli Whitney (December 8, 1765 - January 8, 1825), inventor of the American System of manufacturing and the assembly line, was the first to use them when he won a contract with the U.S. Government to create muskets (rifles). Whitney revolutionized the American system of manufacturing in 1799, using the ideas of division of labor and of engineering tolerance, to create what is known today as the assembly line; to create assemblies from parts in a repeatable manner.

The first automobile to be mass produced in the United States was the 1901, Curved Dash Oldsmobile, built by the American car manufacturer Ransome Eli Olds (1864-1950). Olds invented the basic concept of the assembly line and started the Detroit area automobile industry.

In 1899, with a growing experience of gasoline engines, Olds moved to Detroit to start the Olds Motor Works, and produce low-priced cars. He produced 425 "Curved Dash Olds" in 1901, and was America's leading auto manufacturer from 1901 to 1904. (Bellis)

American car manufacturer, Henry Ford (1863-1947) invented an improved assembly line and installed the first conveyor belt-based assembly line in his car factory in Ford's Highland Park, Michigan plant, around 1913-1914. At Ford the assembly line was first adapted in the department that built the Model T's magneto, which generated electricity for the ignition system. Previously, one worker had assembled each magneto from start to finish. Under the new approach, each worker performed a single task on each unit as it passed his station on a conveyor belt.

The man who puts in a bolt does not put on a nut," said Ford. "And the man who puts on the nut does not tighten it."

The assembly line reduced production costs for cars by reducing assembly time. Ford's famous Model T. was assembled in ninety-three minutes. After installing the moving assembly lines in his factory in 1913, Ford became the world's biggest car manufacturer. By 1927, 15 million Model Ts had been manufactured. (Bellis)

Following is a report of the day Henry Ford put his assembly line into motion.

For the first time, Henry Ford's entire Highland Park, Michigan automobile factory is run on a continuously moving assembly line when the chassis -- the automobile's frame -- is assembled using the revolutionary industrial technique. A motor and rope pulled the chassis past workers and parts on the factory floor, cutting the man-hours required to complete one "Model T" from 12-1/2 hours to six. Within a year, further assembly line improvements reduced the time required to 93 man-minutes. The staggering increase in productivity affected by Ford's use of the moving assembly line allowed him to drastically reduce the cost of the Model T, thereby accomplishing his dream of making the car affordable to ordinary consumers." (History.com).

The principle of continuous movement is perhaps the simplest and most obvious fact of an assembly line, dating back to Assyrian times, where there is evidence of a system of bucket elevators called the "chain of pots." Miners in medieval

Europe also used these bucket elevators, and by the time of the Renaissance, engineers were becoming familiar with some form of the assembly line. In the fourteenth century, for example, the shipbuilding arsenal of Venice used moving lines of prefabricated parts to equip their war galleys. What may have been the first powered-roller conveyer system was introduced in 1804 by the British Navy's automatic production of biscuits or "hardtack." It used a steam engine to power its rollers. By the 1830s, the principle of continuous processing was starting to enter the consciousness of manufacturers, although it was by no means fully embraced until the 1870s in the United States. By then, the principles of division of labor and interchangeable parts had been successfully demonstrated by the American inventors Eli Whitney (1765-1825) and Samuel Colt (1814-1862). (Assembly Line - History)

The assembly line was first used on a large scale by the meat-packing industries of Chicago and Cincinnati during the 1870s. These slaughterhouses used monorail trolleys to move suspended carcasses past a line of stationary workers, each of whom did one specific task. Contrary to most factories' lines in which products are gradually put together step-by-step, this first assembly line was in fact more of a "disassembly" line, since each worker butchered a piece of a diminishing animal. The apparent breakthroughs in efficiency and productivity that were achieved by these meat packers were not immediately realized by any other industry until Ford designed his assembly line in 1913. Ford openly admitted using the meat-packing lines as a model. His success not only brought automobile ownership within the grasp of the average person, but it served notice to all types of manufacturers that the assembly line was here to stay. The assembly line transformed in a revolutionary way the manner and organization of work and by the end of World War I, the principle of continuous movement was sweeping mass-production industries of the world and was soon to become an integral part of modern industry. (Assembly Line - History).

When manufacturers first implemented the idea of the assembly line, they enjoyed dramatic gains in productivity, and the consumer realized lower costs. However, the nature of work in a factory changed radically. Skilled workers were replaced by semi-skilled or even unskilled workers, since tasks had been minutely compartmentalized or broken down and each person was responsible only for assembling or adding one particular part. Manufacturers soon realized however, that not only were a great number of managers and supervisors required to oversee these laborers, but a high degree of preplanning on their part was essential. Overall operations had become much more complex and correct sequencing was essential. Thus, before actual assembly line production could begin, proper design of both the product and the assembly line itself had to be accomplished. Even the simplest tasks were critical to its overall success, and the apparently straightforward assembly line became a highly complex process when broken down and considered step-by-step. (Assembly Line - History)