Behavior and
Characteristics of
Manufacturing
Materials
121
8
Chapter Highlights
• Life cycle analysis is an essential process for
environmentally responsive lean and green
manufacturing.
• Materials science and engineering as a career
field.
• Methods for classifying materials by their
unique properties.
• Environmental responsibilities and legislation
regulating the use of industrial materials.
• The importance of Material Safety Data Sheets
for identifying and classifying materials.
• Methods for regulating generation and disposal
of hazardous materials.
Introduction
It is difficult to imagine living a day without any
exposure to manufactured products. Infants live in
an environment surrounded by cribs, playpens, high
chairs, car seats, toys, medications, and other things
designed to suit their unique needs. Many adolescents
enjoy engineered products such as bicycles, DVDs,
electronic games, and products specifically marketed
to adolescents. Adults use products such as cars and
trucks, laptop computers, machinery at work, and
health care products that become important to their
daily lives. Thankfully, most of these products are
well-designed and pose no safety risk to individuals
using them. However, in the race to get products to
market faster than the competition, some products are
poorly designed, are made of inappropriate materi-
als, or are poorly constructed. Problems with poorly
designed and unsafe consumer products have become
so prevalent that the federal government created the
Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to pro-
vide increased protection from dangerous products.
A recall of Rival Slow Cookers, because of a poorly
designed handle that can break causing burns to the
user, was issued in 2005. This recall affected approxi-
mately 2.6 million units.