Originally Posted by Geof  I don't find it hard to argue in favor of cutting tools and I addressed your point in the first post. Without modern cutting tools to remove large amounts of material very quickly much of the fancy geometry that is possible with the other two in my 'Big Three' would not be economically feasible because the time to machine many of these shapes would be too long. |
Well, what factor of improvement do you suppose that modern cutting tools achieve, when compared to cutting tools from 50 years ago? Because being able to create geometry that was not possible before is a productivity improvement on the order of infinity, and that's pretty hard to compete with.
Also, to state that, "much of the fancy geometry... would not be economically feasible," is to pre-suppose knowledge of prevailing economic conditions in a made-up universe.
I would submit that any part incorporating "fancy geometry" in our made up universe is either an alternative to a part that performs the same function (albeit less well... for whatever reason) without such "fancy geometry", in which case the same productivity penalty for lack of newer cutting tools applies equally to the simpler part, resulting in a wash, or else it's a part that fulfills a new role, it's new technology that would not exist without our ability to create "fancy geometry", and therefore the productivity increase is truly infinite.