On Wed, 17 Sep 2008 03:50:57 +0000, Christopher Tidy
wrote:

Hi folks,

I apologise if the title is a bit of a mouthful. But I've been thinking
about this issue for some time, and would like to seek the opinion of
people here. You frequently hear people complain about the quality of
modern products and say things like "They don't make them like they used
to". But it has occurred to me that maybe older products look good today
because only the good products have stood the test of time, and the poor
products have been thrown away years ago. What do people think? Were
products better in general back in the fifties, say, or were there a
mixture of good and bad? I'd be interested to hear people's opinions, as
I'm not old enough to remember myself.

Best wishes,

Chris

Engineers and manufacturing do the best they can given the cost and
schedule constraints placed upon them. Global competition has
brought considerably sharper focus on how to make products that
consumers will buy in volume.

In some niche markets, they make 'em better than they used to.
Example: production rifles that will shoot 1/2 MOA right out of the
box are quite common now. This kind of accuracy was only available in
customized and "accurized" rifles not that many years ago.

Why? Mostly because CNC machining (and designs to exploit it) can
produce better accuracy at lower cost than previous production
methods.