Sorry Jim Elwell I thought that injection molds are something to be sold to end user. But after sending that mail, I realised that it is used to make some other products. So, is the mold used to make something with feet or inch marking on it or for making plastic cans with a capacity of gallon or quart. If it is so, then its difficult to dispose off. I do agree that these companies will be left in a problem unless the molding machine/mold is flexible enough that its shape and size can be changed. In fact I have a wrench at home (which I bought last year) and it carries inch markings. I am not going to throw it. But atleast the companies should be able to label their products in metric. This should not be a problem. Anyway thanks a lot for bring the real life industrial situation to USMA listserver. My sincere thanks to your explanation. Madan __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get personalized email addresses from Yahoo! Mail - only $35 a year! http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/
Madan asks questions about injection molds. Before I answer, let me point out what his questions illustrate: if you have not worked in a particular business or profession or company, you CANNOT really know the impact of any piece of legislation on it. There are about 15 million businesses in this country, employing about 150 million people, and with trillions of dollars of physical assets. No person can begin to even know what these businesses do, let alone how metric mandates would affect them. In the first place, there is too much to know. In the second place, much of that knowledge is diffuse, and does not exist anywhere except in the minds of those who have to know it (owners, managers, employees, etc.). Onto his questions. With respect to a 2 to 3 year phase in: I have injection molds that are 10 years old, and one of them will probably be good for at least another ten. Some types of printers love old "letter presses" and the price for such presses that are 50 years old keeps going up. I have personally seen in use a letter press that was on a US Navy ship in WWII -- and the owner was mighty proud of it. I have seen old Bridgeport mills that are going strong after 30 years. In other words, there is no adequate phase-in period. Regardless of what you pick, the value of some capital assets will be destroyed. Read into that "lawsuits." Madan mentions something about "selling" my injections molds. An injection mold is an entirely custom piece of hardware. Who would I sell it to? Even without metric mandates, it would be hard to find anyone who wanted it. If metric mandates make it useless to me, it would useless to anyone else, and thus its value would be destroyed. I am not trying to say that metrication cannot happen. I believe it will happen, as companies determine when it is best for them to move to metric. What I am saying is that any mandate will destroy the value of some assets (and no one can say how many), and that brings up the takings problem and legal wrangling. Jim Elwell
