SHIPBUILDING INDUSTRY IN THE UNITED STATES. 211 
tures and equipment built to varying specifications, and to whom do the advantages and dis- 
advantages accrue respectively? 
It is to be noted that the Department of Commerce, under Mr. Hoover’s leadership, is 
endeavoring to eliminate waste and reduce costs and so to extend the benefits resulting from 
simplified practices in industry. The machinery that it is proposed to set up will be represen- 
tative of all interests concerned and will have safeguards to prevent rejection of newer and 
better ideas as they come along. 
Mr. Hoover uses the word “simplification,” which is not the same as “standardization,” 
though in many respects the two will be hard to separate. It is well to bear in mind the 
differences between the two words; their meanings and applications will converge and diverge 
as we study our subject in all its ramifications. 
The procedure suggested by Mr. Hoover is very much that of the American Society for 
Testing Materials, where producers and consumers sit down together and agree to agree or 
agree to disagree on :tandard specifications for the major materials and their subdivisions. 
A study of Mr. leMaistre’s paper referred to above will throw an interesting light on 
what is being done alcng the lines of standardization and simplification in British shipbuild- 
ing and other industries. 
A study of the pocket books issued by the different steel manufacturers will impress one 
with the vast number of special shapes to which steel is rolled; that a gradual reduction in 
number of special shapes would benefit everyone concerned will hardly be disputed. As 
existing commercial equipment wears out this becomes at least possible. 
STANDARDIZED METHODS. 
Regarding standardized methods of production, shipyards are organizations subdivided 
into many departments or trades. They are not unaware of what is going on in the general 
industrial world in the way of advanced methods. There are at least two good reasons why 
the practices of factories, pure and simple, cannot be fully applied; one is the diversity of 
product as between ship and ship, and the other is diversity of parts entering in to any 
one ship. ; 
What all efficient yards are doing, particularly since the present depression set in, is to 
so organize their methods as to adopt for each shop the best that can be worked in. We 
all have certain routine ways of doing things. In a poor plant the routine runs the plant 
for a certain or uncertain season; in a good plant the routine is modified and improved con- 
servatively and constantly in such a way as to cut down work, save time and labor, eliminate 
duplication, and also secure harmony and effective intermeshing of departments. 
Too much departmentalization will kill any shipyard. You all know the small-minded 
departmentalist who cares not what happens to the department on each side of him, just 
so long as his particular department makes a good showing. 
Modern established yards have their own standard ways of handling work; from design 
to delivery, standard forms and methods are used. These should only be changed conserva- 
tively, and after the management is sure that they have all the cards on the table; a change 
made to suit one noisy departmentalist will almost surely bring trouble and can very easily 
change a profit into a loss on the completed ship. We also have standard specifications. For 
yards handling more or less one line of work, this is undoubtedly correct; for yards with a 
diversified product it is still correct, but cannot be made to work without greater labor in 
