Editing Factory system (section)

===Machine tools and interchangeable parts===
An early instance of transition from skilled craftsmen to [[Machine tool| machine tools]] began in the late eighteenth century. In 1774, [[John Wilkinson (industrialist) |John Wilkinson]] invented a method for boring cannon-barrels that were straight and true every time. He adapted this method to bore piston cylinders in the [[Steam engine|steam engines]] of [[James Watt]]. This boring machine was "probably the first metal-cutting tool capable of doing large work with anything like modern accuracy."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Roe |first=Joseph Wickham |url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/English_and_American_Tool_Builders/X-EJAAAAIAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=probably%20the%20first%20metal-cutting%20tool%20capable%20of%20doing%20large%20work%20with%20anything%20like%20modern%20accuracy |title=English and American Tool Builders |date=1916 |publisher=Yale University Press |page=11 |language=en}}</ref>

Mass production using [[interchangeable parts]] was first achieved in 1803 by [[Marc Isambard Brunel]] in cooperation with [[Henry Maudslay]] and Simon Goodrich, under the management of (with contributions by) Brigadier-General Sir [[Samuel Bentham]], the Inspector General of Naval Works at [[Portsmouth Block Mills]] at [[Portsmouth Dockyard]], for the British Royal Navy during the [[Napoleonic Wars]]. By 1808 annual production had reached 130,000 [[Block (sailing) |sailing blocks]].<ref>{{Citation |title= Enlightenment & measurement |publisher= Making the modern world |url=http://www.makingthemodernworld.org.uk/stories/enlightenment_and_measurement/05.ST.02/?scene=3&tv=true |place=[[United Kingdom|UK]] |access-date=2016-11-11 |archive-url= http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20170405150102/http://www.makingthemodernworld.org.uk/stories/enlightenment_and_measurement/05.ST.02/?scene=3&tv=true |archive-date= 2017-04-05 |url-status= dead }}.</ref><ref>{{Citation |title=Portsmouth dockyard |place=UK |url=http://www.portsmouthdockyard.org.uk/Page%206.htm |access-date=2016-11-11 |archive-date=2020-02-26 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200226122038/https://portsmouthdockyard.org.uk/Page%206.htm |url-status=dead }}.</ref><ref>{{Citation |contribution=Block |title=Collections |publisher=Science museum |contribution-url= http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/collections/exhiblets/block/ |place= UK | type = exhiblet}}.</ref><ref>{{Citation |last= Gilbert |first= KR |title= The Portsmouth Block-making Machinery |place= London |year= 1965}}.</ref>{{Page needed |date= July 2015}}<ref>{{Citation |last= Cooper |first= CC | title= The Production Line at Portsmouth Block Mill | journal= Industrial Archaeology Review |volume= VI |year= 1982 |pages= 28–44}}.</ref>{{Page needed |date=July 2015}}<ref>{{Citation |last=Cooper |first=CC |title=The Portsmouth System of Manufacture |journal= Technology and Culture |volume=25 |year = 1984 |issue=2 | pages =182–225|doi=10.2307/3104712 |jstor=3104712 |s2cid=111936139 }}.</ref>{{Page needed |date=July 2015}}<ref>{{Citation |last=Coad |first=Jonathan |title=The Royal Dockyards 1690–1850 |place= Aldershot |year= 1989}}.</ref>{{Page needed |date= July 2015}}<ref>{{Citation |last= Coad |first= Jonathan | title =The Portsmouth Block Mills : Bentham, Brunel and the start of the Royal Navy's Industrial Revolution |year=2005 |publisher= English Heritage |isbn=1-873592-87-6 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=pz8hAQAAIAAJ}}.</ref>{{Page needed |date=July 2015}}<ref>{{Citation |last=Wilkin |first=Susan |title=The application of emerging new technologies by Portsmouth Dockyard, 1790–1815 |publisher=The Open University |type=PhD Thesis |year=1999}} (copies available from the British Thesis service of the British Library).</ref><ref>{{Citation |editor1-last= Cantrell |editor1-first= J | editor2-last =Cookson |editor2-first= G |title= Henry Maudslay and the Pioneers of the Machine Age |place= Stroud |year= 2002}}.</ref>  This method of working did not catch on in general manufacturing in Britain for many decades, and when it did it was imported from America, becoming known as the ''[[American system of manufacturing]]'', even though it had originated in England.