ABSTRACT
It is interesting then to look at the title of this chapter and find the word “Modern,” meaning “involving recent techniques, methods, or ideas,” next to “Manufacturing,” one of the oldest known human endeavors. From the earliest arrows (created of wood, flint, feathers, and sinew) to aircraft (created of aluminum, titanium, steel, nickel, and their alloys, polymers, ceramics, composites, cloth, and many other materials), human minds have struggled to efficiently create products that meet the demands of consumers and improve the quality of life. Surely all of that effort must have long since explored and exhausted the entire spectrum of possible manufacturing techniques and processes. Nothing could be further from the truth! In fact, even though many manufacturing processes are thousands of years old, the pace of process improvement, and the pace of development of new manufacturing processes, continues to rapidly increase. Many examples of the latest developments and technologies of manufacturing are presented here.
