R%%SONS FOR AVOIDING AN AUTOMATION PROGRAM AT THIS TIME

Jacob Rabinow Rabinow Engineering Company

Washington, D. C.

Abstract

The speaker makes the statement that much of the present work in automation seems to be a mat- ter of fashion rather than of hard, common sense thinking. It is charged that projects like the NEIS "Tinkertoy", and some of the applications of printed circuits are unjustified economically, or from the point of view of the needs of national defense. It appears to the speaker that a great deal of effort is spent in automating the trivial and the inexpensive.

He emphasizes that there are great dangers in designing equipment to use the modular approach, tihere the intention is to service the equipment by replacing complete sub-assemblies rather than the individual component parts. Tine thesis is presented that electronics is too ycung an indus- try to be put in a straight jacket of standardized assemblies at this date. The admonition is made that automation is not new, and that as always it should be applied only where very careful cost studies indicate its desirability.

(Editor's Note: Mr. Rabinow's remarks to the session were presented informally and a full text was not available on the date of publication.)

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