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We Don't Make Anything Anymore (WRONG)

Ries

Diamond
Joined
Mar 15, 2004
Location
Edison Washington USA
All the time, I hear people say we don't manufacture anything in the USA anymore.
This is complete hogwash, but it seems to be widely believed.

I thought I would post a bit about the stuff WE make in my little rural neck of the woods, thousands of miles from the manufacturing centers of the USA.
But I thought a lot of people here actually make stuff- modern, sophisticated, expensive, complicated, MANUFACTURED stuff, right here in the USA, and would invite you to post about the stuff you make, or is made near you.

Industry in the USA is far from dead, and, in fact, we lead the world in many many categories.

For instance, if I walk outside my shop, I can see Anacortes Wa, less than 10 miles as the crow flies, across the bay. They build things there, at Dakota Creek, like these articulated tugboats- the largest and most sophisticated ever made, 16,000 hp, hot rods of the river-

Dakota Creek Industries, Inc. » M/V LEGACY CLASS ARTICULATED TUGS

Five miles the other way, Team Corp. is making some of the best test equipment in the world for seismic modelling- again, complicated, expensive, and exported to the japanese, so they can model skyscraper foundations in Tokyo.
Seismic

Even closer, Paccar has one of the most advanced truck engineering facilities in the world- with test rooms that can snow, blow winds, heat like an oven, or shake a full size semi truck, while being monitored by sensors of all types. I see the test mule semis roll by my shop every week, developing new body and engine mods, which, again, are exported, for top dollar, all over the world, as finished Kenworth and Peterbilt trucks.
Yes, thats an oval track for semis, in the picture, with an offroad course in the middle.
PACCAR Inc

Thats just a tiny sample- we make all kinds of world class stuff up here in the woods.
 
You would not think that there was anything left to create in the fret or coping saw arena, but I am alive and doing well by manufacturing in the U.S.A. The world's finest saws of this type used to be made in Germany, but I now have two German distributors: Dieter Schmidt and Dictum that carry my line, as well as Lee Valley, Rio Grande, etc. I have several employees, run a cnc twin spindle lathe (Ganesh CS, and a Daewoo 1632 vmc, and we are hard pressed to keep. Starting to look for a horizontal.
Knew Concepts - Fine Metalsmithing Equipment Designed for Artisans - The Red Saw - Santa Cruz, CA

Lee (the saw guy)
 
Finally.
An "I call bullshit on that" thread to the naysayers.

Here's my link:
Glass to Metal Seals Manufacture - Hermetically Sealed Packages

We make hermetically sealed eyelets and covers.

We MANUFACTURE every piece (save the glass pills which we purchase from an American supplier) and do all assembly, inspection, post process assembly (I.E. clips, bending, and spot welding).

In other words, we do it all.

Oh.......and we sell TO china, among MANY other countries.
 
We make all sorts medical, defense, and computer industry devices that we could not possibly sell to China or many other nations due to export restrictions. We manufacture these devices in the U.S. from U.S. sourced raw material into the finished product. We also only employ people that are legally allowed to work in the U.S..
 
Here in the Midwest, we make all kinds of stuff. Growing corn and making things is pretty much all we do. Coincidentally, we make a lot of stuff that is used to grow that corn.

In Peoria, we have Caterpillar, of course. They still make all the biggest dozers right here in town. They still run a huge foundry and do a ton of machining in house. Komatsu is here too. They probably wanted to share the supplier base that Cat built up.

There is plenty of other stuff going on. We have green start ups making efficient water heaters. We have companies making elevators and utility beds for trucks.

The problem is that we just don't need that many people to make all this stuff.
 
Brad Holloway and I are getting ready to start producing the first domestically built Airsoft gun. We spent two years designing and tooling to start production this summer. 95% of the parts are made in the US and it will be assembled in Fort Wayne, IN. Ox and my dad, rds6709, produce parts for the gun. 6 zinc die cast tools in Rhode Island, 2 stamping dies in New Jersey, 3 injection mold tools in Illinois, 3 in South Bend, and 3 in Ohio. Along with 1 aluminum die cast tool in Muncie. All the machined parts are made in about a 50 mile radius of Fort Wayne. Roughly 170 unique components and about 200 total parts.

M4 Carbine Airsoft Rifle - YouTube
 
I make stakes and jumpring cutting machines and hydraulic presses. I ship them all over the world. I have even shipped to china, on more than one occasion.
 
I'll go ahead and post the link for the small-ish tool and die shop I work for: Master Tool & Die, Inc., Experts in Designing and Building Metal Stamping Dies

We make, well, progressive dies, stamping dies, die repair... well you get the idea. We make tools to help companies make tens or hundreds of thousands of parts, and although I'm the FNG, I have already helped make replacement parts for dies that have moved through three countries already, and have been in use in every one.

As far as the area, well, damn, where do I start? I didn't even realize the number of shops making all sorts of products around here until I was in school and started looking at jobs in machining. Pay is good here, even if the weather sucks!

Growing corn and making things is pretty much all we do.

Speak for yourself! All we grow around Minneapolis is mosquitoes in the summer, and ice for the other nine months.
 
All the time, I hear people say we don't manufacture anything in the USA anymore.
This is complete hogwash, but it seems to be widely believed.

I thought I would post a bit about the stuff WE make in my little rural neck of the woods, thousands of miles from the manufacturing centers of the USA.
But I thought a lot of people here actually make stuff- modern, sophisticated, expensive, complicated, MANUFACTURED stuff, right here in the USA, and would invite you to post about the stuff you make, or is made near you.

Industry in the USA is far from dead, and, in fact, we lead the world in many many categories.

For instance, if I walk outside my shop, I can see Anacortes Wa, less than 10 miles as the crow flies, across the bay. They build things there, at Dakota Creek, like these articulated tugboats- the largest and most sophisticated ever made, 16,000 hp, hot rods of the river-

Dakota Creek Industries, Inc. » M/V LEGACY CLASS ARTICULATED TUGS

Five miles the other way, Team Corp. is making some of the best test equipment in the world for seismic modelling- again, complicated, expensive, and exported to the japanese, so they can model skyscraper foundations in Tokyo.
Seismic

Even closer, Paccar has one of the most advanced truck engineering facilities in the world- with test rooms that can snow, blow winds, heat like an oven, or shake a full size semi truck, while being monitored by sensors of all types. I see the test mule semis roll by my shop every week, developing new body and engine mods, which, again, are exported, for top dollar, all over the world, as finished Kenworth and Peterbilt trucks.
Yes, thats an oval track for semis, in the picture, with an offroad course in the middle.
PACCAR Inc

Thats just a tiny sample- we make all kinds of world class stuff up here in the woods.

It's not being built at Dakota Creek. It is at Pascagoula MS. Virtually of its machinery is foreign, such as the Wartsilla engines. With a 30 foot draft it will like see very little river time.
 
We manufacture our patented flange along with a line of 100 different versions in house , from start to finish . Many are for our own customer base but we are expanding and selling them to other driveline shops around the country.
 

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It's not being built at Dakota Creek. It is at Pascagoula MS. Virtually of its machinery is foreign, such as the Wartsilla engines. With a 30 foot draft it will like see very little river time.

You are not right.
The BARGES are being built in Pascagoula. The Three Tugs were already built at Dakota Creek. I drive by there all the time, and can assure you they have acres and acres of shipyard, plasma cutting sheds bigger than your average house, and somewhere around 500 employees. They build ships there- I have seen em get bigger, get launched, and sail away.

Yes, the engines are imported, but a lot of other parts are domestic.
That is unusual, though- most of the ships Dakota Creek builds have CAT or Cummins engines.

I saw several of these being built- 300 feet long.
http://dakotacreek.com/dci/projects/new-construction/imr-vessel-ross-candies/

Within 50 miles of my house, there are probably 20 shipyards, including a yard that built the BMW Americas Cup boats for 2010.
There is a guy down the road from me who builds tugs, oil spill response boats, and other work boats- http://rozemaboatworks.com/oil_spill_response.html
Another shop a few miles away makes really cool landing craft style work boats with front ramps. You can run em up on any beach, and unload ATVs or even trucks, depending on size. Fire and rescue, dive support, military, cargo, they build over fifty a year.
http://www.munsonboats.com/military.html

There are tons more- none of em are in Mississippi.
Many high end yacht builders around here, like Nordic Tug-http://nordictugs.com/index.php
these things aint cheap, and they sell em all over the world.

I have ex-employees who have worked at most of em at one time or another.

This is just one little corner of American Boatbuilding- but its all high tech, high value added, and most of them export to some degree.
 
I work for a jewelry manufacturing company, also in Santa Cruz, CA. (Didn't realize Lee was here in town. I've admired those saws of yours since before I saw your posts here.) We've got most of a dozen CNCs between all the 30 tapers and the swiss automatics. The cost of living is ridiculous, but my commute is all beach, all the way. We export all over the world. I do, unfortunately, get to watch most of our designs get knocked off, but even still we're doing nothing but growing and getting busier. Strangely, this little college/beach town is full of manufacturing and machine shops.
 
Antagonist...if you work for who I think you do (on Ingalls) I am only about two blocks away, and the greatest used tool dealer ever (Rowe Machine) is on Delaware.

Lee (the saw guy)
 
Trailer Hitches and Towing Products | CURT Manufacturing

Last towing accessories company made in the US as of last fall (when Reese and Draw-Tite moved to Mexico)

Not a whole heck of a lot going on here from the machining standpoint, but we are cranking out 16,000 hitches a week!

Had no idea Curt was from right here in Wi. Recently I made a thread about what vehicle and hitch to get for a trip down to Kansas and Ok towing a trailer. My sis went with a Curt hitch for her Merc instead of the factory MB hitch.

Wisconsin sure has a lot of manufacturing.

There's the well known brands like Snap-On and Harley-Davidson , and brands the average consumer does not think of like Manitowoc crane, one of the leading manufacturers of small to heavy lift cranes. Oshkosh truck corp who supplies a lot of the military's trucks and commerical vehicles for other agencies and companies. Then there is Kohler, Briggs & Stratton and P & H Minepro , who makes those enormous mining shovels and walking draglines that are exported globally.
 
Had no idea Curt was from right here in Wi. Recently I made a thread about what vehicle and hitch to get for a trip down to Kansas and Ok towing a trailer. My sis went with a Curt hitch for her Merc instead of the factory MB hitch.

Wisconsin sure has a lot of manufacturing.

There's the well known brands like Snap-On and Harley-Davidson , and brands the average consumer does not think of like Manitowoc crane, one of the leading manufacturers of small to heavy lift cranes. Oshkosh truck corp who supplies a lot of the military's trucks and commerical vehicles for other agencies and companies. Then there is Kohler, Briggs & Stratton and P & H Minepro , who makes those enormous mining shovels and walking draglines that are exported globally.

Well thank her for buying something from us. I see a lot of Curt hitches on my long drives, and i get a little bit of a warm fuzzy when I know I most likely had something to do with it.

Can't forget Generac, Stoughton Trailers, Rockwell Automation, and of course, Presto (makers of the best cooking device ever, the pizzaz). Shame the GM plant in Janesville closed, that hit the area hard. Even worse that the plant was in such poor shape that very few people are interested in taking over the mess. Hopefully sometime.
 
Not to pick fly droppings from pepper, but . . .

Trailer Hitches and Towing Products | CURT Manufacturing

Last towing accessories company made in the US as of last fall (when Reese and Draw-Tite moved to Mexico)

Not a whole heck of a lot going on here from the machining standpoint, but we are cranking out 16,000 hitches a week!

I need to double check, but I just opened up a box with a brand new forged class 7 hitch from Curt with a made in China label on the ball and ball mount. Sloppy fit in the receiver and big disappointment :(

Can't forget . . . Rockwell Automation, . . .
. We buy 100's of thousands of dollars worth of Rockwell hardware each year. Yes a lot of engineering done in the US, but fair to say that very little comes in that is actually made in the USA.

On balance, we design and manufacture a lot of specialty equipment for Paper, Glass Container, Aerospace, and Forest Products Industries along with a huge variety of general motion related equipment. Enough to keep 50 employees busy and turning work away.
 
Motion, you are correct, our balls, forged one pieces, and other such things are made overseas. The only lathe we have in house is a old manual that won't be making anything accurately.
The hitches themselves, however, are all made here. Additionally, with the new owners there is a big push to pull everything in house, which will keep me and the first shift guy busy.

Edit: What is the number on the ball mount itself? I don't believe we have any of those outsourced, though I could be wrong (and it would be interesting to know)
 








 
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