Maintenance Management - Assignment Example

EXAM PAPER FOR MAINTENANCE MANAGEMENT Student’s name Course &Code Professor’s name University City Date Question one The industrial revolution has greatly made changes in the way various industries manufacture their products. The modern technology has significantly changed the duration taken in manufacture and construction of certain products. Essentially, global rapid population growth has triggered various changes in the construction and manufacturing centre. Industries and Construction Companies aim at producing affordable products that are market friendly. Additionally, global economic growth has changed the way manufacture and constructions are done. Companies are shifting to the use of modern technology in production. In this regard, construction companies have embraced use of Modern Methods of Construction (MMC) as a remedy to lack of affordable houses. Most government and individuals have advocated for technological construction means since it produces affordable houses hence solving the problem of lack of houses (Construction Training Fund, 2014). Use of modern methods of construction appears as a solution to provision of cheap and affordable houses. However, this cannot be advocated for fully since over the past years the methods have been used but failed. Consequently, analyzing the impact of MMC as a remedy to solving house crisis is vital before concluding its usefulness. As such, this retrospect answer seeks to explain the impacts of the vogue for new and innovative construction techniques as a solution to provision of affordable houses in relation to the duration of survival of the houses. Firstly, embracing MMC in construction of houses with the aim of provision of affordable houses is not ideal since it calls for new training (Construction Training Fund, 2014). Engineers and constructors who trained in the olden days lack the modern skills of construction. As a result, these constructors are not supposed to use modern technology in house construction. Apparently, most individuals consider using experienced constructor to perform the construction process. The end result of this is constructing a substandard modern based house (Construction Training Fund, 2014). Essentially, the MMC calls for pre-fabrication, this is a modern technology that calls for retraining of the earlier trained constructors. Consequently, failure to train these older constructors on modern means of construction leads to poor output. Evidently, use of MMC will not serve as a remedy for acquisition of affordable houses since the houses will not be able to last for long. Additionally, these houses will pose various challenges to the users because their state will not be satisfied. Simply put, the contractors who were used to construct the houses lacked the knowledge on modern technological ways of house construction (Construction Training Fund, 2014). Use of MMC cannot be fully satisfied to be a remedy to provision of affordable houses that will help solve the housing crisis since the houses will not last for a longer period of time. Secondly, use of modern technologies in constructions requires utilization of local metropolitan (Bock et al., 2015). The technology requires that the personnel involved in the construction process have knowledge about soil topography of a specified location. Using regional or national workforce leads to poor quality service production. Essentially, pre-fabrication construction is not done since the constructor lacks basic knowledge of the soil terrain of the location. Apparently, in most cases an individual seeking to build a house does not take into account the location of the constructor that they tend to hire. They consider any construction company of their choice. Consequently, the house that is constructed without earlier basic knowledge of the land state will not serve its purpose fully since it cannot last for a long duration of time (Bock et al., 2015). The house will not serve its expected purpose since it will collapse within a short period of time. Thirdly, houses constructed by use of MMC are not always long lasting (Hounshell, 2012). The construction cost of these houses is always expensive since they focus on modern technology. From experience, these houses do not last for a longer period of time since they are constructed very quickly. In the recent past houses took a considerable duration of time in their construction. Various engineers and constructors did not rush in finishing a house since the houses were expected to be strong and long lasting. Currently, most houses end up collapsing within a short period of time after their construction (Hounshell, 2012). As a result, use of Modern Methods of Construction cannot be justified as a solution to provision of affordable houses since the whole process is expensive. Essentially, after collapsing of a modern house, the user will have to consider constructing another house. The whole process becomes expensive expenditure as compared to construction of one strong house based on the older building techniques. It is therefore vogue to consider MMC as a solution to provision of affordable houses since the whole aspect turns out to be more expensive to the users. Fourthly, technological advancement has led to production of counterfeit products in most of the manufacturing sectors (Tim, 2015). In this regard, the materials which are technologically produced to be used in modern construction are not properly produced. Companies that produce genuine construction materials tend to sale their products at a slightly high price. On the other hand, counterfeit construction products are very cheap and readily available. As such, most constructors and house owners tend to consider cost effective construction materials so as to reduce on the construction cost. This leads to low quality house construction that endangers the lives of the users (Tim, 2015). Evidently, counterfeit products do not last for a longer period of time and the houses constructed by use of these products are likely to collapse. The lives of the users of these technologically constructed houses are put at risk since they can lose their lives at any time. Therefore, use of MMC cannot be justified as a solution for provision of affordable houses. Lastly, the whole MMC process is automated hence requires less supervision form the constructors (IPENZ Engineers New Zealand, 2015). Various modern machines are used in the construction process hence reducing the work of the constructors. Essentially, in the recent past, houses had to be supervised thoroughly by various engineers before they were satisfied to be occupied by human beings. The methods and materials used for construction were also inspected properly before using them. Currently, the process is done automatically by use of various machines. Machines are considered to be accurate in their operations but sometimes they can fail. Historical evidence shows that most of the construction machines tend to fail during their actual operations in the construction process. Additionally, technologically constructed houses end up wearing out very fast without serving their intended duration of time (IPENZ Engineers New Zealand, 2015). It is therefore, not accurate to conclude that use of modern technology will help in provision of affordable houses and solve the housing crisis. The whole process has various challenges that are associated with it. Historical facts show that consideration of old construction techniques that is technologically based led to provision of strong and long lasting houses. Reference List Bock, T., Georgoulas, C. & Linner, T. (2015). Advanced Construction and Building Technology for Society. International Council for Research in Building and Construction pp. 134 vol. 1 Construction Training Fund. (2014). The Impact of New Technologies on the Construction Industry. Council for Research in Building and Construction in Australia Hounshell, D. A.. (2012). From the American System to Mass Production. Accessed from http://www.iaarc.org/news/a_news_2012_10_24.pdf [on 5th August 2015] IPENZ Engineers New Zealand. (2015). Standards and Regulation for Building Construction in New Zealand. Accessed from http://www.ipenz.org.nz/ipenz/documents/ipenz-royalcommissioncanterbury2011.pdf [on 5th August 2015] Tim, C. (2015).The Design Implications of Mass Customization. Internal Research Journal Read More