This post from my Quora feed was an interesting read, and puts things into perspective.......
Remember the Air Force toilet seat that cost $10,000?
Here’s the deal.
The C-5 Galaxy, once the largest cargo aircraft in the world, first flew in 1968. Hundreds of them were made.
After a few decades, they developed cracks. Parts needed to be replaced.
The spare stock of toilet seats was depleted.
These are not your average Home Depot toilet seats.
Originally $640 as part of a fleet of aircraft, the cost was different when there were none to be had. So Lockheed had to prototype a new mold, prepare new factory floor space, and schedule skilled labor to make threel, count ‘em, (3) three items. Cost to the taxpayer $9,700 each. Time from order to fill: one year.
So when Air Force contractors started using 3D “printing,” the toilet seat was the first thing to be ordered. $300, 3 hours.
I remember there was a time when soldiers did not wear protective armor (flak vests). In fact, the first American soldiers arriving in WWI France had to ask the British for helmets!
When a jet flies from Missouri to a war zone in the Stans, drops a half-million dollar smart bomb on two enemy guys in a cave, and 5 Americans get to come home on their feet—not in boxes, I don’t complain.
If you don’t like the cost of war—don’t do it.
ADDED
Probably everyone should understand what’s happening here.
I used to work in an aircraft factory. Also, I was an officer in the Air Force, in charge of fabricating parts and installing them.
.... the actual “toilet seat cover” in question is a complicated shape that includes two walls of the lavatory, the top and front of the actual sitting area, and it is perfectly fit to the curvature of the aircraft’s tubular structure. Probably 6 feet tall and 5 feet wide, with curves reinforced to take twenty years of torsion twisting forces in flight. The material itself, say a flat sheet of it, would have to be flawless with no microbubbles that could burst if the airplane loses pressurization at 40,000 feet. And the whole, curved and twisted structure would have to maintain its shape to support the aircraft in the case of a hard-landing or a water-landing without breaking or cracking. Plus, it would have to be designed so that it didn’t warp or twist over 20 years of a dozen landings per day, yet as light as possible to save fuel.
A mold will be made by professionals who measure the aircraft, make a mold, break it, try again, break it, try again, until it works on a prototype and the prototypes fits perfectly. This may take several skilled workers a week or two or more to get it right.
Then the actual materials come in.
First, a “release oil” is applied evenly to every part of the mold. A gel coat “paint” is applied to an exact thickness, say half a mm. Immediately a team dressed in environmental clothing and respirators will being laying the composite material, layer by layer, for the rest of the day. This is done in a certified safe-for-the-environment facility with chemical filters to clean the air. The filters are the size of the wall on the right and the wall on the left. Air is moved through the facility at a slow but constant rate.
The materials are composites that are laid by hand into the mold and sealed in a plastic bag and the air is sucked out by a compressor so the resin is pushed into the cotton, wood and glass (tiny, tiny shards of glass, millions of them) and then the mold is left in suction for three days so the chemicals (flammable) can “cure” to harden.
These materials don’t “dry.” Instead, they “cure” through a reinforcing chemical reaction that gets the stuff very hot. When it cools, it’s done.
Then a specialist comes in to open the mold, drill the fasteners in the exact locations exactly where they are placed on all 200 C-5 aircraft around the world.
The mold and jigs and special tools used for this process are then photographed, measured and mapped out and kept on file for the life of the corporation. They are intellectual property and including in the net worth of the company.
The molds, jigs and tools are placed in storage so they can be found in 20 years when they are used again OR the legal department has crafted an agreement allowing the company to destroy the molds to save storage space.
Finally, the product is inspected, which might involve passing ultrasound waves through it or passing an electrical eddy current any metal surfaces of it, or getting a giant X-ray. (No kidding).
The images are examined by a composites radiologist and are dated, signed, indexed in a database and kept in storage in case the Air Force needs to see them in 30–40–50 years for a crash investigation.
Packaging is built custom-made to keep it all in its proper shape, even if the crate ends up on the bottom of other heavier crates. Then it is shipped to the destination where the company or its contractors will carry it into the aircraft and install it using specialized fasteners that are guaranteed not to vibrate loose during inflight vibrations or in case of a hard landing.
Once the contractor has finished the installation, an inspector certified by the FAA will sign the forms, making himself personally liable for anything that goes wrong. His company pays for insurance and lawyers to cover him with professional insurance.
At that point, an Air Force representative (the pilot) will inspect it, sign possession of it, and the contractor will bill the Air Force contracting office for all the expenses of all the procedures above.
And all the workers are covered by Workers Comp, unemployment insurance, and health benefits. These guys, most of them, are experts, we want to keep them and their families on our side.
Then, they do the next one. And the next.
Since this is a high profile case that affects the stock price, I expect that throughout all of this Public relations and investor relations will get photos and videos (using professional teams) to make slick presentations and YouTube videos and give press conferences and feed champagne to senators and governors and give donuts and coffee to their security details.
That’s included in the cost, too.
Easy peezy.
Remember the Air Force toilet seat that cost $10,000?
Here’s the deal.
The C-5 Galaxy, once the largest cargo aircraft in the world, first flew in 1968. Hundreds of them were made.
After a few decades, they developed cracks. Parts needed to be replaced.
The spare stock of toilet seats was depleted.
These are not your average Home Depot toilet seats.
Originally $640 as part of a fleet of aircraft, the cost was different when there were none to be had. So Lockheed had to prototype a new mold, prepare new factory floor space, and schedule skilled labor to make threel, count ‘em, (3) three items. Cost to the taxpayer $9,700 each. Time from order to fill: one year.
So when Air Force contractors started using 3D “printing,” the toilet seat was the first thing to be ordered. $300, 3 hours.
I remember there was a time when soldiers did not wear protective armor (flak vests). In fact, the first American soldiers arriving in WWI France had to ask the British for helmets!
When a jet flies from Missouri to a war zone in the Stans, drops a half-million dollar smart bomb on two enemy guys in a cave, and 5 Americans get to come home on their feet—not in boxes, I don’t complain.
If you don’t like the cost of war—don’t do it.
ADDED
Probably everyone should understand what’s happening here.
I used to work in an aircraft factory. Also, I was an officer in the Air Force, in charge of fabricating parts and installing them.
.... the actual “toilet seat cover” in question is a complicated shape that includes two walls of the lavatory, the top and front of the actual sitting area, and it is perfectly fit to the curvature of the aircraft’s tubular structure. Probably 6 feet tall and 5 feet wide, with curves reinforced to take twenty years of torsion twisting forces in flight. The material itself, say a flat sheet of it, would have to be flawless with no microbubbles that could burst if the airplane loses pressurization at 40,000 feet. And the whole, curved and twisted structure would have to maintain its shape to support the aircraft in the case of a hard-landing or a water-landing without breaking or cracking. Plus, it would have to be designed so that it didn’t warp or twist over 20 years of a dozen landings per day, yet as light as possible to save fuel.
A mold will be made by professionals who measure the aircraft, make a mold, break it, try again, break it, try again, until it works on a prototype and the prototypes fits perfectly. This may take several skilled workers a week or two or more to get it right.
Then the actual materials come in.
First, a “release oil” is applied evenly to every part of the mold. A gel coat “paint” is applied to an exact thickness, say half a mm. Immediately a team dressed in environmental clothing and respirators will being laying the composite material, layer by layer, for the rest of the day. This is done in a certified safe-for-the-environment facility with chemical filters to clean the air. The filters are the size of the wall on the right and the wall on the left. Air is moved through the facility at a slow but constant rate.
The materials are composites that are laid by hand into the mold and sealed in a plastic bag and the air is sucked out by a compressor so the resin is pushed into the cotton, wood and glass (tiny, tiny shards of glass, millions of them) and then the mold is left in suction for three days so the chemicals (flammable) can “cure” to harden.
These materials don’t “dry.” Instead, they “cure” through a reinforcing chemical reaction that gets the stuff very hot. When it cools, it’s done.
Then a specialist comes in to open the mold, drill the fasteners in the exact locations exactly where they are placed on all 200 C-5 aircraft around the world.
The mold and jigs and special tools used for this process are then photographed, measured and mapped out and kept on file for the life of the corporation. They are intellectual property and including in the net worth of the company.
The molds, jigs and tools are placed in storage so they can be found in 20 years when they are used again OR the legal department has crafted an agreement allowing the company to destroy the molds to save storage space.
Finally, the product is inspected, which might involve passing ultrasound waves through it or passing an electrical eddy current any metal surfaces of it, or getting a giant X-ray. (No kidding).
The images are examined by a composites radiologist and are dated, signed, indexed in a database and kept in storage in case the Air Force needs to see them in 30–40–50 years for a crash investigation.
Packaging is built custom-made to keep it all in its proper shape, even if the crate ends up on the bottom of other heavier crates. Then it is shipped to the destination where the company or its contractors will carry it into the aircraft and install it using specialized fasteners that are guaranteed not to vibrate loose during inflight vibrations or in case of a hard landing.
Once the contractor has finished the installation, an inspector certified by the FAA will sign the forms, making himself personally liable for anything that goes wrong. His company pays for insurance and lawyers to cover him with professional insurance.
At that point, an Air Force representative (the pilot) will inspect it, sign possession of it, and the contractor will bill the Air Force contracting office for all the expenses of all the procedures above.
And all the workers are covered by Workers Comp, unemployment insurance, and health benefits. These guys, most of them, are experts, we want to keep them and their families on our side.
Then, they do the next one. And the next.
Since this is a high profile case that affects the stock price, I expect that throughout all of this Public relations and investor relations will get photos and videos (using professional teams) to make slick presentations and YouTube videos and give press conferences and feed champagne to senators and governors and give donuts and coffee to their security details.
That’s included in the cost, too.
Easy peezy.
