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Re: [ontolog-forum] Ontological Means for Systems Engineering

To: Pat Hayes <phayes@xxxxxxx>
Cc: "[ontolog-forum]" <ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
From: Ed Barkmeyer <edbark@xxxxxxxx>
Date: Fri, 23 Jan 2009 14:46:11 -0500
Message-id: <497A1E83.2000603@xxxxxxxx>
Pat Hayes wrote:    (01)

>> The analog is 16th-18th century
>> European manufacturing, in which all parts were hand-made and
>> hand-fitted.  (I think Eli Whitney is credited with developing the
>> 'standard parts' concept for his machines.
> 
> It seems to have occurred to a number of people around the same time. 
> Eli Terry revolutionized clock-making and the Springfield rifle did the 
> same for firearms, and a little later in the UK, I.K. Brunel did the 
> same for boat manufacturing. In each case, the critical advance was 
> mechanical uniformity and precision in manufacturing resulting in 
> intersubstitutable 'standard' parts.     (02)

I picked up the following bit from (where else?) Wikipedia:    (03)

   "Though Whitney is popularly credited with the invention of a musket 
that could be manufactured with interchangeable parts, the idea predated 
him. The idea is credited to Jean Baptiste Vaquette de Gribeauval, a 
French artillerist, and credits for finally perfecting the "armory 
system," or "American system of manufacturing", is given by historian 
Merritt Roe Smith to Captain John H. Hall and by historian Diana Muir 
writing in Reflections in Bullough's Pond to Simeon North. In From the 
American System to Mass Production, historian David A. Hounshell 
described how de Gribeauval's idea propagated from France to the 
colonies via two routes: from Honoré Blanc through his friend Thomas 
Jefferson, and via Major Louis de Tousard, another French artillerist 
who was instrumental in establishing West Point, teaching the young 
officer corps of the Continental Army, and establishing the armories at 
Springfield and Harpers Ferry."    (04)

Gribeauval is known in military histories for standardizing the sizes of 
shot and the bores of French field and siege cannon around 1780, which 
made their artillery arm significantly more efficient during the French 
revolution and enabled Napoleon to use "combined arms" tactics involving 
infantry, cavalry and artillery.  But I didn't know he was considered 
the father of interchangeable parts.  Yet another military technology 
with much wider civilian uses.    (05)

-Ed    (06)

-- 
Edward J. Barkmeyer                        Email: edbark@xxxxxxxx
National Institute of Standards & Technology
Manufacturing Systems Integration Division
100 Bureau Drive, Stop 8263                Tel: +1 301-975-3528
Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8263                FAX: +1 301-975-4694    (07)

"The opinions expressed above do not reflect consensus of NIST,
  and have not been reviewed by any Government authority."    (08)

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