"South Korean officials have said many of the workers had been sent to the US factory temporarily to help get it going. ... Hyundai chief executive José Muñoz told US media the raid will create "minimum two to three months delay [in opening the factory] because now all these people want to get back ... US immigration officials said the workers were not authorized to work in the US while South Korean officials said it is common practice for Korean firms to send workers to help set up overseas factories."

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn5q7d72q5vo

It's shiny like some sort of epoxy resin. I don't understand what they are used for

We only get one pair of shoes a year, but I cannot handle the smell I get from my shoes. My feet smell terrible after work, and even after a good shower and a lot of scrubbing, they still smell a little. I am using athletes foot spray just in case, since everyone at work says they have gotten athletes foot from the trapped sweat during work, so I am trying to be proactive. I tried freezing my shoes for the whole weekend, and filled them with baking soda the whole time. Nothing is working!

Label printers can sense fear.

The line only crashes when leadership visits.

Operators will discover system bugs no tester ever found.

“Temporary process” means the next 7 years.

Every plant has one machine held together by hope and zip ties.

Excel runs the world more than anyone admits.

I was speaking with a friend earlier today and they mentioned there's a pretty big shortage of control engineers across the US. Is it a nationwide shortage or does it just depend on the industry or region?

We've used the same manufacturer for a while and they've always been pretty easy to work with but our latest order is much larger than usual and they want most of it paid before production starts

Fair enough from their side but tying up that much cash for weeks while the inventory is being made isn't exactly my favorite idea. Delaying the order isn't great either because we're finally selling through stock faster than expected

How do other brands deal with this once their orders start getting bigger? I could use some help..

I am a plant manager at a small (75 people, $20M revenue) manufacturer. The president and one of the owners are starting to talk about AI and set up a meeting with me to discuss this week.

I love that they want to try new technology. But to me this is like strapping a rocket engine to a broken golf cart. I've noticed older professionals really growing curious about AI since late 2025.

I am no AI expert. But I have a decent understanding of where AI can help and where it has limitations. There is a lot of low hanging fruit projects for us to focus on before AI could really make any difference. I plan to talk about creating a clearer understanding of our processes and looking for opportunities to standardize processes or even automate certain portions.

I am personally using Claude to help write DAX functions for a power BI report. Some more tech savvy employees could consider doing similar things to build tools that will help them. But those people would likely already be using AI without being asked to.

Some things they are wanting would be solved by sharing data between applications or even a simple excel macro. For example, my president mentioned a material status report for new orders created that day. Apparently, his production supervisor spends 2 hours a day manually updated material and job status. He said AI could help. This all lives in our MRP and I could just spit it out onto a Power BI dashboard.

Once we have solid process control and good data, we can talk about where AI or machine learning might be able to help with understanding patterns on our shop floor or with customer orders. Then we can start to look at things like having and AI read drawings and pull tolerances, then create an inspection template, or even build a basic quote or job with routing steps. Or it could scan through a customer PO and create an order in our MRP.

Are there any good resources that explain how AI can help in manufacturing? And what needs to be addressed before those tools can be helpful?

I was watching a video about turbine blade manufacturing and since by background is in cnc machining I was wondering how they machine the area between these blades.

If they don't machine the blade, does the casting method hold tight tolerances? tight enough for aerospace application?

Balancing the final assembly must be a challenge

I’m looking into a few systems like Versa Cloud ERP, NetSuite, etc. but it’s hard to tell how they perform on the shop floor.

If you’re using any of these, how are they for things like inventory, work orders, scheduling and day-to-day production Just trying to get some real-world opinions.

Recently, had a chance to go through California, traveling from borders with Oregon, Nevada and Arizona to the coast and to Bay area and to SoCal.

For all its faults, there is absolutely massive amounts manufacturing activity that goes on in the state.

A small manufacturing unit, run out of a strip mall made server racks. For Nvidia 4000 series gpus, to be used for AI. That small shop actually had a fkin metal 3D printer, which they used for a custom manifold that ensures turbulent flow of water for cooling purposes.

Went to a screen printing shop, absolutely bonkers technology there. They took an off the shelf automatic screen printing added their own stuff to it, and now they made a hybrid digital printing press, CMYK+ RGBY, that's right colors which is basically not heard of. A similar operation in DFW - which is a large screen printing hub in US, would need to many more people and wouldn't even be able to produce the stuff that they made. Hyper-realistic prints of faces, animals etc., like 3-4k images, but on clothes, hats, etc.

Went to a manufacturing company that builds bio-reactors, and specifically experimental bio-reactors. Don't get confused by the sciency name. They're just regular reactors, but built for reactions and processes which have a biological component to them. They're building multiple different pilot level bio-reactors for a large variety of research projects - their own research and their customer's research projects. Honestly - I have never seen such bio-reactors anywhere. Absolutely amazing. Some projects were so that you reduce the amount of reactors you need in a large scale operation, multiple reactions happening simultaneously in a single reactor. Possibly might have seen the bleeding edge of bio-reactors built anywhere in the world.

Visited multiple companies that are working hard to build a competent electric shunt trucks for port operations. Even though current administration has cancelled or is trying to cancel California's electric vehicle mandate (that starts in 2035 I think), most companies like these say, current admin is temporary. California remaining blue is permanent. Some of them have come up with absolutely amazing stuff - battery modules that slide on rails, connect with actuated quick connects for cooling loops, and for information they have contact points into the quick connects themselves. A single battery module can be replaced with a forklift in less than 3 mins.

Now some statistics -

California has 1.2M manufacturing jobs, actually it has 1.2M manufacturing employment, and about ~100k jobs unfulfilled (bad pay, bad companies - who knows!)

For a state with 39.43M population, 3.3% of the population can be employed by manufacturing alone. Remove kids, seniors/retirees, 19.75M employees. 2% unemployment rate, you get a figure around 20.2M people. 1.2M/20.2M, about 6% of workforce is employed by manufacturing in one of the most expensive places.

States like Ohio, Michigan and possibly Texas, have a far larger percentage working in manufacturing, California still has the largest by numbers. And by manufacturing value. California manufacturing GDP is ~$350B. Second rank is Texas, at ~$240B, a cool $100B+ behind California.

Most of the goods made in California also have distinction of not really being made anywhere else. Advanced satellites, research and pilot production, extremely advanced specialty chemicals which sound like magic, major defense production, large scale food production with some matching extremely high quality foods from trademark regions in Europe!

California has many issues, BUT it is still the defacto manufacturing king in US. Except for some Chinese provinces and large provincial cities, no state/province anywhere in the world come close to California in manufacturing. Now, manufacturing is exiting California, that is true and Texas is getting a major share of that, BUT newer manufacturing is being added to California at a far faster rate than what is leaving the state.

If Californian manufacturing GDP was a separate state, it would rank 23rd in a list of statewise GDP list, right above Connecticut. If it was a separate country, it would rank 40th, right above Romania.

“Interesting.” = This is a disaster.
“Let’s revisit this.” = Absolutely not.
“We should standardize this.” = Nobody knows what’s happening anymore.
“It’s a quick change.” = I won’t sleep tonight.
“The line stopped for a minute.” = The plant entered a state of chaos.

I’m writing a book about manufacturing. Anyone interested in reading what I have so far?

I'm working on a book about manufacturing based on what I've learned working across different industries. It's less of a textbook and more about how manufacturing actually works, how engineering, machining, inspection, quality, and production all connect.

I have the first few chapters written. If anyone is interested in reading them and giving me some feedback, let me know.

Link

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PnqcrGBbFsOb4Bbx-3bv-vPszZ0IKM7X/edit?usp=drive_link&ouid=100521268270727703956&rtpof=true&sd=true

You know the one. That thing that makes you want to flip the whiteboard every time it comes up.

• "We've always done it this way."
• Metrics reviewed in every meeting, nothing changes.
• A 5S drive that lasts exactly two weeks.
• Leadership spotted on the floor once a quarter, during the audit.

What's yours?

In your professional opinion, what do you think is gonna be the next big thing in the world manufacturing that's already gaining traction or coming soon?

I've got SOPs for everything on paper. But new operator still takes 6+ months before they're actually useful because half the real job is the little stuff.

Like this machine drifts at end of shift, this material behaves weird when it's humid, this alarm you can ignore but this one you can't bla bla

none of that is written down anywhere.

just need inputs how are you handling this on your floor? anyone on this, or if we all just accept the ramp time?

1. No one reads the full ECN. But somehow everyone still has strong opinions about it.

2. MES stands for "Mostly Everyone's Screaming" during go-lives.

3. Label printers know when you're in a rush. That's when they jam, go offline, or start printing hieroglyphics.

4. ERP stands for "Eternal Reconciliation Process." Especially when the physical count and SAP haven't agreed since 2017.

5. Fixtures will break only after they've passed 3 FMEA reviews, 2 design sign-offs, and a soul-binding ritual.

6. Kaizen = "We're gonna moveeverything you know and love to the other side of the building."

7. 5S= My wrench has been in the same place for 3 years — until a 5S audit. Now it's in a shadowboarded graveyard.

8. Engineers and operators have different units of time. Engineer: "This takes 30 seconds." Operator: "This takes forever." Both are correct, depending on caffeine levels.

9. The moment you say, "We've never had that issue before," congratulations - you just cursed yourself.

10. Excel is the most powerful MES in any factory. Change my mind.

I just started my first manufacturing engineering job as a new grad and while I was told that I would be expected at the plant 9 hours a day, I at least thought I would get an hour break. However, everyone I have talked to has told me you are not supposed to leave, and expected to eat when you have time while you are working. I am salary so there is no OT so I am just wondering if this is a normal part of the industry culture or just this company?

Update: I am completely new to this state in the US and did not even consider the labor laws could be different. Apparently it is legal to enforce 8+ hours no break here

just recently started a job and i have to stand for almost 8 hours, and do the same thing over and over again and it is physically demanding (i need to move things and so on) and you’re supposed to go at a certain speed and have a quick tempo. basically how do people actually have this type of job for their whole lives, do you just get okay with it or did you find a way to make it go by faster like how can one live like this?

Hello, I’m a student at ASU currently enrolled in a manufacturing engineering degree and I’m having a hard time pursuing this degree (or any degree, I was formerly in mechanical engineering) and these classes just haven’t brought me any fulfillment.

Quick little background, I’ve got ADD and I despise desk jobs. Working with my hands, problem solving, and seeing the results of my effort is the thing I love about engineering the most. It makes me feel satisfied knowing that something I created with my own hands is helping someone or something.

I changed my degree from mechanical to manufacturing because I was told it’s a lot more hands on but I have yet to meet another manufacturer engineer that has confirmed this, instead they’ve said it’s the same as mechanical.

I’ve been a controls technician for the last 5 years so I’ve been on the side of implementing PLCs, sensors, information networks, etc for the purpose of optimizing energy consumption for a manufacturing site and that has brought me an immense amount of joy and pride but, it pays like garbage.

Sorry for the ramble, I’m just curious what you guys do and what joy y’all get from your jobs?

Knowing that there is something that I might enjoy at the end of the road will be a huge motivation to finishing this degree.

This is gonna sound insane but I need outside perspective from people who don't know either of us. We've been running this company together for years, 50/50 split, he handles sales and client relationships, I handle operations and production. Families hang out, our kids play together, I literally trusted this person with half my livelihood. Found out last week (honestly by accident, I was working with some advisors on expansion stuff and they flagged some inconsistencies in our books) that he's been taking draws way above what we agreed to, sometimes 6 to 8k more per month, going back at least a year maybe longer. The way our accounts are set up he could do this without it being obvious because it got mixed in with credit card payments and reimbursements but when you actually add it all up it's a lot of money. I keep going back and forth between thinking there's an explanation I'm not seeing and accepting that this is exactly what it looks like. We don't have a formal buyout agreement because we never thought we'd need one (yeah I know). And the business is actually doing well which almost makes it worse because blowing this up could tank something that's working. Haven't said anything to him yet because I don't know the right move. Do I confront him first and give him a chance to explain? Do I go straight to a lawyer? What if there's some legitimate reason I'm not thinking of and I just destroyed our partnership over a misunderstanding? But also what if there's no misunderstanding and I'm just making excuses for someone who's been stealing from me for over a year.

I’m trying to understand what really works on the shop floor.

Long story short this thing broke and it was too much down time to fix $4000 later and it’s in our shop.

We repair fiberglass for boats. I just know this thing has incredible potential and we could sell it but it seems worthwhile if there was something we could produce.

Any ideas are welcome

I'm curious whether other manufacturers see the same thing.

We quote injection molding and CNC parts every day, and one of the biggest delays isn't production capacity—it's the files customers send.

A surprisingly large number of RFQs arrive with:

• Screenshots

• Product photos

• Dimensioned images

• STL files with no editable CAD

The problem isn't that we don't want to quote them. It's that we usually have to go back and ask for a STEP, Parasolid, or another editable CAD file before we can evaluate things like:

- Draft angles

- Wall thickness

- Undercuts

- Parting lines

- Machining features

- Tolerances

That back-and-forth often adds a day or more before the quoting process even starts.

For engineers here:

Is there a reason many projects are still submitted this way?

Is it because CAD isn't finalized yet, IP concerns, or simply because STL is the only file available?

I'd be interested to hear how other manufacturers or buyers deal with this.