In WW 2 some US factories were converted to make planes, tanks, etc. I assume that would be much more difficult now with robots and computers that are used in just about everything?
Maybe the best they could do now is expand to 2 or 3 shifts on the current assembly lines. Or start up lines that are currently not being used.
In part, it would depend on what the factory normally produces vs what its being retooled to produce for the military. A factory that makes car engines won’t have much [del]trouble[/del] retooling to make engines for small aircraft
The typewriter factory probably wouldn’t have too much trouble retooling to make small intricate bits of machinery, such as timing fuses for bombs for instance
That Ford factory being retooled to build tanks instead of trucks? Well, they have specialty companies today that build armored and tracked vehicles. Maybe just step up production to provide regular vehicles for military use, maybe in the heavy duty truck lines.
Basically it probably wouldn’t actually happen today, because retooling in WWII was in response to adopting new technology which didn’t have an established manufacturing or industry base already. However I would think that with robotics and computing retooling might actually be a bit easier for some things.
Whenever you make a new product, there’s a certain amount of retooling required. That’s just the way it goes. It doesn’t matter if you are making a new model car or a new military vehicle. There’s definitely a cost involved, and production doesn’t ramp up overnight. It takes some time to retool and refit the line.
Companies also don’t tend to have unused lines sitting around.
Current wars tend to be fought out of inventory. There are a lot of military assets that are produced in relatively small numbers. If those assets are needed in greater numbers, those assembly lines can dramatically increase their output, but they generally can’t ramp up to WWII type production rates. For that, you’d need to put some serious investment into new production facilities.
A new facility is difficult in the sense that you don’t just flip a switch and new stuff comes off of the line, but this is something companies do with new products all the time. It’s not that difficult from a corporate or manufacturing point of view. There’s a big initial investment of resources, and then you crank out as much of the product as you can. That’s the way we do everything from toasters to nuclear bombs these days.
You cannot just shift an assembly line from producing one product on first shift to another product on a second or third shift, and “lines that are currently not being used” are not going to be staffed or tooled for producing anything. The question in the o.p. seems to reflect a view of manufacturing that is very abstract, as if a manufacturer can flip a switch and just start producing weapon systems instead of children’s toys, which is not the way anything in manufacturing works.
To produce any product you need three things; supplies (basic fabrication materials or subcomponents), specifications and work instructions for making and inspecting the parts, and training for workers or programming for robots to actually do the labor of fabrication or assembly. Military products beyond basic textiles tend to require very specialized materials and processes by virtue of performing specialized functions with high reliability requirements under extreme duty environments. They also tend to have very detailed specifications and documentation requirements at every level from basic subcomponents such as fasteners and materials to the finished product. And the labor to assemble them–especially when it comes to complex systems like modern aircraft or complicated weapons–requires extensive training in both the assembly and verification testing. There is also the overhead in dealing with a large bureaucracy which procures the system; depending on what branch and how complex the product is, there may be on-site quality representatives (e.g. DCMA), multiple layers of procuring contracting officers, and requirements for complex analysis, qualification, and acceptance/lot acceptance testing including environmental and dynamic environments (thermal cycle, thermal vacuum, accelerated aging, shock, vibration, acceleration, et cetera).
There are manufacturers which specialize in doing limited production runs of complex products such as limited run lines of cars, but they are generally not set up with the contracting structure and qualification/acceptance testing capabilities required for defense system procurement, nor are they generally on an “approved manufacturers list” that procurement authorities draw from. Most facilities that produce complex equipment for military use are built to do so from the ground up. Even companies that produce a single type of product, such as tires or personal weapons, often have dedicated production lines or facilities for items that are specifically made for military use.
Stranger
this is sort of what I tried to say and didn’t. Retooling for war in WWII was in response to producing things that were new technology without established manufacturing base. We needed those things NOW, in LARGE NUMBERS and it was quicker and easier to retool that Chevrolet factory and save those resources for a more direct war effort, than it was to build a new specialty factory to churn out tanks. These days though, we have the industrial/manufacturing base for military equipment well established.
I meant to add output they could add a 2nd or 3rd shift at the factory that now does military production.
I know it would not make sense to make cars on 1st shift and tanks, etc. on shifts 2 and 3.
I’d think it would be totally dependent on just how similar the military equipment in question was to similar commercial products.
For example, nearly any clothing manufacturer could gear up to produce uniforms without too much trouble. Similarly any firearms manufacturer could relatively easily switch to producing military small arms. In a longer term view, a company like Navistar could probably ramp up to make military trucks without heroic efforts.
OTOH, the larger ticket items are more complex and specialized than in years past, so it would be much tougher to switch a civilian factory over to start producing them.
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If you have the skills in-house, it’s about as difficult as tooling up for any change in production - the bigger the difference from what you’re used to making, the harder it gets. There’s a certain ‘systemology’ - inheriteed & learned knowledge - associated with any kind of product that has to be acquired if you don’t already have it. That above and beyond acquiring the tools and dies.
A great example is the L85 rifle that the UK uses - It was initially designed by some very smart engineers… that had no weapons design experience. There were… problems. Eventually, the UK hired H&K to resolve the problems, at the effective cost of an extra new rifle for every one refurbished. Sure, H&K was owned by the maker of the L85, but the key point is that H&K had the systemology, and the fixes, whilst numerous, were mostly fairly subtle. The designers had it about 95% right, but that last 5% depended on accumulated knowledge that’s not written down anywhere that Joe Engineer fresh from school can find it.
You can see it in the rejection rate of early US-made licensed production of mature UK designs in WWI and WWII - It’s not that US factories counldn’t do it, it’s that they didn’t know the small tricks and subtlties needed to do it 100%. This didn’t stop companies from learning, but there was a learning curve to overcome.
Inland, Remington (typewriters) and IBM all made, for instance, rifles. LOTS of rifles. Singer (sewing machines) made rifles and bombsights. They changed to military manufacture, but it took a bit - Mostly, it took willing sharing of knowledge between companies and a LOT of money.
You might think that but there are some complexities with producing goods for the military, or for government use in general. Military uniforms are basic textile goods but most DoD contracts specify that all components and sometimes even materials have to be domestically sourced and to MIL specifications , so now you have to find a textile mill willing to produce a mil spec fabric (specific dyes, weight, and stitching control), find a domestic source of the appropriate buttons, snaps, and zippers, et cetera.
For mechanically complex products the sourcing requirements are even more complex, as are contracting (hosting afformentioned DCMA or other reps), training, documentation, acceptance and inspection requirements, et cetera, as well as special materials which are not commonly used in commercial products. As an example, I once worked for a construction equipment manufacturer which produced a line of machines for the US Army. Despite the fact that these machines has substantial commonality with the commercial product lines, the military product had its own production line, separate place in the warehouse, separate inventory tracking and planning system, and beause of the special anti-fungus and anti-static coatings the paint line had to be shut down, cleaned, and reconfigured every couple of months to do a run of these machines.
Stranger
What Stranger said, too. Knowing and navigating the bureacracy of Mil Procurement is part of the systemology that most overlook. It’s a heavy administrative burden.