Glass Faucets
Fire Truck Ladders
Antique Clock Restoration
Barbecue Utensils

Glass faucets elevate indoor plumbing to an art form.

The glass is hand-crafted in a range of shapes and patterns for visual effect.

Metal components are fused into the glass to deliver one of the necessities of modern life, running water.

Glass faucets are about both form and function.

Glass faucets have a delicate beauty, but they're stronger than they look.

The glass is very thick, allowing the faucets to hold up to heavy use.

Making a glass faucet starts with chunks of clear glass.

A glass worker loads the glass into an oven at 2,190 degrees fahrenheit.

Another worker selects black and white billets of glass to add stripes and patterns to the clear glass.

He preheats them so the glass won't shock and fracture when exposed to higher temperatures.

With a metal rod, he gathers a clump of the clear glass from the main oven.

With the chunk of glass, he picks up the preheated white cylinder, simultaneously exposing both to the flames.

This process makes the glass flexible.

Using a curved wood tool, the glass worker gathers the clear glass at the base and wraps it around the white billet, encapsulating it.

He attaches the other end of the glass to a second metal rod.

This allows the glass to stretch as he pulls it across the room.

The glass is now over 35 feet long and pencil-thin.

It starts to cool and solidify immediately as it's set down.

The glass workers tap the glass against a piece of metal to break it into 8-inch pieces called canes.

They shape another piece of clear glass by rolling it on a metal table called a marver.

The glass worker blows through the metal rod, causing the glass on the end to bubble.

It will eventually become the faucet and two handles.

He adds a layer of black molten glass to the bubble.

Another glass technician arranges the striped canes on a grooved iron plate and heats them with a torch.

Meanwhile, a glass worker rolls the hot glass bubble onto the canes, which stick together.

Then it's back into the furnace, and the white-striped canes melt into the black bubble.

Next, the craftsman rolls the glass across the marver repeatedly.

He pinches the canes at the top, closing them around the bubble.

The glass is reheated to keep it pliable as the craftsman continues to form it.

The craftsman transforms the bubble into a hollow glass tube then elongating the tube to its desired length.

Using a pincer-leg tool, he forms the end into a round handle shape while another glass worker applies heat to the glass with a torch.

This keeps the glass pliable.

He then creates a hole for a piece of metal hardware.

Then he applies molten glass to the metal hardware and inserts the hardware into the round faucet handle.

This cuts the handle free from the rest of the glass.

Using a forming tool, the craftsman refines the shape of the glass.

Next, he preheats a metal mold.

This stops the hot glass tube from fracturing as he bends it around the mold to shape it into the faucet.

Once the faucet has taken shape, it's ready to go into the annealing oven.

The glass is placed in the oven at a low temperature and then cooled.

This process removes stresses and strengthens the glass.

Meanwhile, using high-pressure water that contains fragments of garnet, a craftsman cuts steel trim rings and a display plate for the showroom.

Next, the craftsman installs the glass faucet on the display plate by threading a nut to the faucet valve.

He installs the trim rings at the base of the handles and assembles them to the display plate using the hardware that's been fused to the inside of the glass.

The craftsman uses a rag to clean the faucet of any fingerprints and smudges.

Finally, construction is complete.

This unique glass faucet is ready to make a statement.

Short fire trucks can easily access tight spaces around the scene of a fire.

That's because they're lighter and can carry more water and equipment.

However, it's difficult for smaller fire trucks to support the weight of long ladders.

To compensate, manufacturers have built longer ladders on shorter trucks.

This 108-foot-long ladder can be mounted on a single rear-axle fire truck.

Typically, a ladder longer than 75 feet requires a tandem-axle truck to support its weight.

The secret to the design of this ladder is that it's lighter, stronger, and durable.

The components are cut from sheets and tubes of high-strength steel.

Using a press brake, the machinist bends the parts, verifying the accuracy of each bend.

Once all the components are prepped, the parts are welded together, then smoothed.

This welded part is the turntable base.

It rotates the ladder 360 degrees and provides a platform for the firefighter at the controls.

This is the torque box.

It supports the aerial pedestal to which both the ladder and turntable are bolted.

To construct the ladder, technicians weld tubular rungs to vertical side rails called base beams.

They reinforce the rungs with diagonal tubes called k-braces, which provide lateral structural strength.

Welders fuse steel tubes between the base beam and the handrail to provide structural support.

Next, an inspector from an independent testing company examines the integrity of the welding.

Once the ladder passes inspection, it's put through a shot-blasting chamber, which pummels the surface with steel pellets.

This process removes metal impurities and preps the surface for painting.

Craftsmen apply two coats of primer, one top coat of color, then two clear coats of paint, sanding by hand between each application.

Next, a three-part anti-skid treatment is applied to the turntable surface-- first, a coat of glue, then an abrasive material, then a coat of sealant, which is baked in an oven for 90 minutes.

The ladder rungs are covered with snap-on non-slip covers made of fiberglass-reinforced plastic.

The ladders are stacked in four or five compact sections.

Technicians install a cable that enables the sections to extend and retract.

The cable is attached to a hydraulic cylinder.

Three telescopic sections of the aerial waterway are attached.

This tube transfers water up to the top of the ladder so when the ladder extends, so does the waterway.

This valve at the top of the waterway allows firefighters to hook up a hose to bring inside the building.

The water monitor, driven by an electric motor, directs the water flow in all directions when the aerial waterway is being used without a hose.

Next, the machinists install the turntable controls, which run the electrical power and the hydraulics that move the ladder.

Then they attach the ladder to the aerial pedestal with a huge pin.

A large bolt is inserted, which prevents the pin from sliding out of place.

This is what's referred to as a rear-mount ladder, meaning it's installed on the back of the fire truck.

When a ladder is installed behind the cab, it's called a mid-mount ladder.

Assembly of the ladder is almost complete.

Technicians bolt the turntable to the truck, then hook up the hydraulic line that operates the ladder.

They install a swivel mechanism which enables the aerial waterway to move with the ladder and turntable.

Before it leaves the factory, the ladder is put through a test run to ensure it meets the highest standards.

An antique clock can only be repaired by an expert.

This person would have either apprenticed under a clockmaker or studied timekeeping at a horology school.

In today's digital landscape, horologists are becoming a vanishing breed.

When your grandfather clock is struggling through old age, it's time for a visit to the master clockmaker.

First step-- the dial and the mechanism are placed on a stand for observation.

Two horologists inspect the clock for worn-down parts.

The mechanism contains two gear trains-- one for keeping time, and another to regulate the hammer that strikes a bell on the hour.

After the paperwork is completed, the clockmaker gets to work.

He detaches the hands and dial to gain access to the gear trains and their linked components.

He removes tiny screws to release the hands.

Then he removes pins that release the dial's four feet, located within holes in the front plate.

An artist restores the dial.

The clockmaker unscrews the cast-iron bell and begins disassembling the assortment of parts, starting with the pallets.

The pallets receive power from the clock's suspended weights and connect with the timekeeping gear train, which moves the pendulum.

The shafts of the hour, minute, and second wheels converge at the center of the largest wheel on the front plate of the mechanism.

The clockmaker disassembles these and other components.

He lifts off the front plate to strip down the inner parts.

The cables suspending the weights are made of woven brass.

The craftsman cleans all the metal parts in an ultrasonic machine.

Its high-frequency sound waves force the chemical solution into all the nooks and crannies.

He rinses the parts and dries them in jeweler's sawdust.

Each part is inspected under a magnifying glass to assess their condition.

If a part is worn, the craftsman tries to restore it to its original shape.

If it's too badly worn, he has to make a replacement with a computer-guided milling machine.

The pin at the end of a gear is called a pivot.

After measuring its diameter with a digital caliper, the clockmaker sets the disk of a filing machine to its corresponding measurement.

He places the pivot between the disk and a fine-grinding disk, filing away any rough surfaces.

Next, the craftsman works on the rear plate, hammering in brass sleeves called bushings into multiple gear holes.

He widens the bushing just enough to insert the pivot and smooths out the hole.

He inserts one end of the pivot in the rear-plate bushing, the other end in the front-plate bushing, and checks that the gear rotates smoothly.

He does the same for each pivot hole.

Then, all the parts are cleaned, and the mechanism is reassembled.

This gear on the front plate is the hour wheel.

The clockmaker attaches the hour rack, which connects to the gear train.

This system regulates the striking of the bell on the hour.

Once the mechanism is reassembled, the horologist attaches the dial to the front plate.

The dial of this clock required no restoration.

Even the original steel hands are still in good condition.

When hands are in bad shape, the clockmaker creates replicas.

When hands are missing, he makes new ones in the style of the period.

During the entire reassembly, the clockmaker wears gloves to protect the steel and brass components from the natural oils in his hands.

Restoring an antique clock can take several weeks of meticulous work.

When it's done, the clockmaker mounts the clock back on the stand, connecting the weights and pendulum, and runs a test.

the job is complete when the clock keeps time and the hammer strikes the bell to announce the hour.

cooking over an open flame calls for a serious set of tools.

Barbecue utensils are durable and designed to withstand the heat.

Built longer than regular kitchen utensils, these tools enable the chef to keep an arm's distance from the flame, making barbecuing a safe and gratifying experience.

When barbecuing, it's important to go big on tools.

These substantial utensils will hold up to the intensity of the flame while also offering precision and control.

Making barbecue utensils starts with a sheet of high-carbon stainless steel.

A laser cuts out several parts, creating turner blades.

Turner blades are broad, enabling the user to flip burgers and fillets without breaking them.

They also have slots for draining grease and juices.

A technician extracts the blades from the matrix and punches out the pre-cut drainage slots.

The turner blades are placed on a rack which lowers the blades between two coarse rollers.

An operator applies polishing compound to the rollers.

As the rollers turn, the friction rubs off stamped information from the steel mill and other blemishes.

Technicians buff the blades to a smooth, matte texture.

This gives the blades a consistent polished finish.

Next, the blade is clamped to a special carriage moving the blade back and forth as a grinding wheel carves a thin beveled edge.

The beveled edge will make it easier to lift meat off the grill.

An operator clamps the turner blade in a fixture.

A hydraulic press bends the neck of the blade.

High-grade walnut is the material used to make the utensil handles.

It's a hard, durable wood with a grain that adds visual interest.

Using a bandsaw, the operator carves the walnut block into smaller chunks.

Each one will become a handle blank.

He places the blanks on a conveyer that takes them through a spinning cutting head.

The cutting head carves a taper into the end of the handle that will hold the blade tang.

To refine the shape, a craftsman locks two handle blanks on a revolving table.

Moving the handles against a router can make the handles smoother for gripping.

It's quite a transformation.

Multiple drill heads carve rivet holes on one side.

The holes have a graduated profile to allow the rivets to sit flush to the wood.

The craftsman drills corresponding holes on the other side.

Using a circular saw, he cuts a slot for the tang-- or stem--  of the barbecue utensil to be inserted and drills one last hole for a piece of rawhide that will hang up the tool.

Next, the craftsman inserts the tang into the slot in the handle and slides a post through one of the holes.

This positions it for a female rivet to be installed from the front.

Male rivets are installed on the other side.

This completes the riveting steps and secures the handle to the turner blade.

Using a coarse sanding belt, the craftsman smooths the rivets to the wood and sands off the metal tang at the protruding sides.

Another technician rubs mineral oil into the wooden handle to give it luster and enhance the grain.

A mixture of ground corn and mineral spirits serves as a gentle abrasive cleaner.

The technician dries off the blade by plunging it into just the ground corn.

With a compressed air gun, she blasts off the corn-cob remnants, examines the tool for defects, and props up the utensil under an engraving laser.

The laser etches the company name into the metal.

This barbecue turner will become part of a set which will act as an extension of the chef's hands, making it possible to cook over an open flame without getting burned.


The distinctive sound of the accordion appears in almost every kind of music.

The piano-style keyboard on the right-hand side produces the melody, while the buttons on the left produce the chord accompaniment.

In between are bellows that force air through reeds, producing that unmistakable accordion sound.

the accordion is a beautiful and complex instrument.

It contains up to 10 sets of steel reeds with different pitches.

Each reed set goes into a wooden block.

Under every section is an opening called a tone hole.

The bellows drives air through it, vibrating the reed above to produce a musical note.

These leather-and-plastic pads cover the slots on the accordion's aluminum reed plates.

Each plate holds two reeds.

Both reeds produce the same note-- one when you push the bellows, the other when you pull.

They now apply a special wax to secure the reeds to the block.

If they used glue, they wouldn't be able to remove the plate should a reed ever need repair.

Each reed played corresponds to a specific note or chord.

To assemble the keyboard, they begin with a lever made of fiberglass-reinforced plastic.

It has a wooden core to give the keys sufficient weight.

A long metal lever goes into the top.

When the musician presses a key, its mechanism unblocks the corresponding tone hole, allowing air to flow inside and vibrate one of the plate's two reeds.

Next, they drive in the steel axle on which the keys pivot.

Then they apply suction to a keyboard-size tray.

In it, they line up the plastic key tops.

In top-of-the-line models, the white key tops are made of celluloid.

With the suction holding the keys down, it's just a matter of flipping the tray and clamping it onto the keyboard frame.

The tops adhere to the levers, which have since received a coat of glue.

After about an hour, the glue is dry.

They cut the suction, and the keyboard is finger-ready.

Meanwhile, the reed blocks are in the hands of a tuning specialist, who pumps air with a foot pedal to vibrate the reeds one at a time.

He compares each note to a reference tone from a tuning apparatus and files the reeds gradually until their pitches match.

Now for the button keyboard.

Starting with the valves, they install a wooden pallet over each tone hole.

To that, they glue a steel lever.

Then to that, they connect a brass rake.

When the rake moves, it pulls the lever, which opens the valve, unblocking the tone hole.

Air enters and vibrates the reed, producing the note.

Each keyboard button opens three valves.

That's why pushing one button produces a three-note chord.

With the complex connections between buttons and reeds complete, the reed blocks go into a celluloid-on-plywood housing.

It'll attach to the bellows made of strong pleated cardboard reinforced with leather and metal corner protectors.

but before permanently attaching the bellows, all the reeds have to undergo a final and very extensive tuning adjustment.

an accordion can have up to 600 reeds, so this meticulous reed-by-reed tuning can take up to 16 hours.

they now pin the bellows' wood frame ends to the treble and bass housings.

Then they cap each housing with a cloth-covered grille to keep out dust.

After polishing the accordion to a high-gloss finish, it's time for a musical road test in white gloves.

There's no sense in leaving fingerprints on that exquisitely polished surface.

With the test checklist complete, the inspector signs off on it.

You can't say this job's all work and no play.

the pineapple is native to south america, but colonization spread it to other tropical areas.

The latin name for pineapple is "ananas," which comes from nana, what the natives called the plant.

The english word "pineapple" came from the european explorers who thought that this strange but delicious fruit looked like a giant pinecone.

Pineapples need temperatures between 73 and 86 degrees fahrenheit and full sun.

It takes seven months for the pineapple plant to produce a bunch of little reddish-purple flowers.

At this first bloom, as it's called, farmers spray the plant with ethylene, a natural gas that stimulates full flowering.

As that happens, the stem of the flower bunch gradually thickens and becomes bulbous.

This is the pineapple.

Five months after first bloom, a year since the last harvest, a fresh crop of pineapples is ripe for the picking.

But not before the farm has tested samples to make sure the sweetness level is just right.

This is prickly business, so the workers have to wear gloves, long sleeves, safety glasses, and rubber boots.

The pineapples travel from the field to the factory upside down.

That way the crown of leaves bears the weight of the fruit during the bumpy ride.

Upon arrival at the factory, the pineapples go through a 10-step cleaning in chlorinated water.

This washes away insects and frog eggs.

Frogs like to lay their eggs in pineapple crowns.

A final rinse with clean water removes any chlorine residue.

Now workers classify the pineapples and cut off misshapen crowns.

A first-class pineapple has a straight crown and no more than three damaged eyes, those diamond shapes on the peel.

If a pineapple passes the first-class test, it's fit for export.

Second-class sells on the domestic market.

Third becomes dried fruit, and fourth, juice.

At the drying plant for third-class pineapples, workers first chop off the crown, and then about two inches from the bottom end.

With a coring machine, they remove the pineapple's hard center called the heart.

Knife-wielding employees work their magic, each peeling five to seven pineapples per minute.

The coarse skin dulls the blades quickly, so they have to keep sharpening their knives about every half-hour.

The peeled pineapples then move on to a slicing machine, which produces slices a little more than a half-inch thick.

The average pineapple yields about seven slices.

Workers place the slices on large trays...

Load the trays on large racks...

Then roll the racks into a gas oven.

The slices bake for 24 hours between 147 and 151 degrees fahrenheit.

This dries them almost completely.

When they come out of the oven, their moisture level is 6%, just enough to ensure the slices are chewy.

From the oven to packaging.

These preservative-free dried pineapple slices stay fresh in the package for 18 months.

Now back to the pineapple factory, where the first-class fruits pass under a shower of hot wax.

Fans cool and harden the wax into a coating that creates an air barrier.

This slows the ripening process, ensuring the pineapples don't overripen by the time they arrive at their export destination.

Last stop is the packaging and labeling department.

Workers box pineapples with and without crowns separately.

Those with crowns are for export.

The crownless ones go to a canning factory to be sliced, diced, or crushed.

From the field to your table, pineapples are the fruit of many people's labors.

Artificial body parts used to be the stuff of science fiction.

Nowadays artificial joints, at least, are routine.

An artificial joint is a prosthesis that surgeons insert to replace diseased or worn-out bone and cartilage.

In nearly all cases, an artificial joint relieves pain and improves the range of motion.

From your knees and hips to your wrists, elbow, and shoulders, if your joints go, you can replace them.

An artificial joint has both metal and plastic components.

The metal acts as bone, the plastic is cartilage.

This factory makes the metal parts three ways.

It either casts them, forges them, or machines them.

Casting is the most complex method.

The first step is to pressure-inject melted wax into an aluminum mold.

This makes a pattern, a wax replica of the metal part.

Now they build the mold for casting the part in metal.

Workers fuse a group of patterns with hot wax to a holder also made of wax.

The patterns will shape the cavity in the molds.

They submerge the patterns in a thick liquid ceramic which soon hardens into a fragile shell around the wax.

Then they sprinkle the shell with a mixture of two minerals-- silica sand and zircon-- to build up a strengthening crust.

The shells now go into a furnace for about two hours.

The intense heat hardens them and incinerates the wax inside, leaving a cavity in the pattern shape.

The shells are now molds strong enough to withstand molten metal.

That metal is cobalt chrome.

In this crucible, the chrome liquefies in about 10 minutes.

They remove the molds from the furnace and lock them to the top of another one above the crucible.

Then they flip it over.

The molten metal flows from the crucible into the molds.

It solidifies within two minutes.

Then they transfer the hot molds to a cooling bin.

Cold air flows around them for about two hours until they're finally cool enough to handle.

Then workers mount each tree on an automated machine that works like a jackhammer.

Each mold disintegrates, freeing the cast-metal part inside.

They use a saw to separate the parts from the tree, then a grinding belt to remove any unnecessary metal that hardened in the channels.

Next, they laser-engrave a unique serial number on each part for tracking purposes.

Every part undergoes a thorough inspection.

They dust the part with fluorescent powder, then rinse it off.

Powder residue settles in any flaw and glows under ultraviolet light.

After inspection, they buff every part until the metal's so shiny, you can see a reflection.

Another method for making metal parts is forging.

They use a titanium alloy, which is more flexible than cobalt chrome, making it better suited for hip joints, in particular.

They clean the metal, then heat it in a 2,200-degree furnace.

This 660-ton press forms one piece at a time into a preliminary shape.

Then they move it to the next die and stamp twice to refine and then finalize the shape.

The last stamping on the third die trims off excess metal and adds detail.

The forged part now goes into a sandblasting chamber which cleans the metal and gives the surface a matte finish.

Here's what the part looks like before sandblasting and after.

Now a computer-guided milling machine smooths away the rough edge that trimming the excess metal left behind.

This removes all but the last bit, so they get rid of that with a sanding belt.

But sanding leaves metal residue behind.

So the parts now go for a bath in a water-based citric solution.

The metal surface has to be perfectly clean in order to stamp on the serial number in ink.

Quite a difference before cleaning and after.

Each and every metal part, whether forged or cast, goes to the quality control department.

There, using digital calipers, an inspector checks all the dimensions, then examines the part under a magnifying glass.

So far we've seen two of the ways they make the metal parts of an artificial joint-- casting and forging.

The third method is coming right up.

The metal portion of an artificial joint plays the role of bone, while the plastic portion mimics cartilage.

However, the plastic isn't your run-of-the-mill plastic.

It's medical-grade polyethylene, meaning it's formulated to be lightweight, but also extremely durable so that it withstands years of wear and tear within the body.

The type of metal they use to make the bone portion of an artificial joint depends on how flexible that joint has to be.

A knee joint requires less elasticity, so they mold it out of cobalt chrome.

A hip joint, on the other hand, needs to be more bendable.

So for that, they use titanium.

They either forge the shape in a press or mount the titanium block on a computer-guided mill.

Under a steady shower of lubricant, the mill's 20-odd machining tools carve the block from all angles.

After a primary rough machining, the mill's precision tools finalize the shape.

From start to finish, machining just one part takes about half an hour.

Now a robot takes over.

It runs the part against a series of sanding belts, their grits progressing from rough to fine.

This removes marks the machining tools left on the metal and polishes the surface to a mirror finish.

The robot can't reach the edges, so a worker sands them manually and verifies the dimensions.

Then the parts go for a thorough cleaning.

The factory puts random samples through wear testing.

The machines simulate joint movement, complete with fake joint fluid.

The factory sprays some parts with titanium powder to help bone tissue to cling to them.

This machine, called an optical comparator, projects an image of the part's coated outline against a technically perfect template.

The technician makes sure the part and the template match.

To become an artificial joint, the metal bone now needs its plastic cartilage.

That requires polyethylene powder.

A technician weighs out a specific amount, puts it in the outer sleeve of a mold, then inserts the mold's inner piece.

The technician loads the mold into a press that applies both pressure and heat-- 374 degrees fahrenheit.

The powder gets squeezed between the mold's two parts and turns into solid plastic.

Using various instruments, they measure the molded part to ensure all its dimensions are exact.

Now a computer-guided machining tool carves the grooves into which the metal part will slide.

These details are far too intricate for a mold to shape.

Then some final measurements to make sure the finished part adheres to the engineering specifications.

Random samples undergo fatigue testing equivalent to 10 years of wear.

Some plastic parts are just too complex to be molded outright, so, instead, the factory molds a block of plastic, then machines it.

The block spins on a lathe as various computer-guided tools shape it.

Samples of these also undergo wear testing.

After a specific number of movements over a specific time period, technicians remove the parts and weigh them.

By comparing to the starting weight, they can calculate how much plastic has worn off.

The packaging room is what they call a clean room, meaning the air runs through a filter system to keep out dust and dirt.

Workers pack the artificial joints against foam to protect the metal surface, because even the tiniest scratch can cause premature wear.

After heat-sealing the packages, the factory ships them off to a sterilization plant.

There, powerful gamma rays penetrate right through the packaging and kill off any bacteria that might be lurking inside.

Make no bones about it, these joints may be artificial, but the movement they restore is as real as it gets.


Pipe Cleaners
Blue Stilton Cheese
Smart Electric Meters
Telescopes

The pipe cleaner was invented early in the 20th century.

A wire core with tufts of yarn, it could be bent and twisted in any tight space, making it useful for cleaning a lot of things besides pipes.

Its flexibility also offers a creative opportunity for those with a crafty bent.

Today many pipe cleaners never get dirty.

Instead of cleaning pipes, kids bend them and shape them to create crafts.

The core component of every pipe cleaner is, of course, the wire made of malleable steel.

There are two wires in every pipe cleaner.

The wires will become intertwined with tufts of yarn, and it will all happen on a machine like this.

But first here's a look at the two wires twisting together without the yarn.

This wire core is the heart of the pipe cleaner.

Without the tight twist, the yarn would just slide off.

The spools of yarn unwind at the same time as the wire and head towards the machine.

They'll use cotton yarn for pipe cleaners destined for actual pipe cleaning because it's absorbent.

For the craft market, polyester fibers are more suitable.

The colors are brighter.

This orange yarn and the wire travel over tension disks to prevent slackening that would cause messy entanglements as the pipe-cleaner materials all head toward the forming machine.

The yarn in the wire are totally in sync as they feed into the machine.

The pile yarn rapidly winds around a metal former to coil it.

At this point, the diameter of the pipe cleaner is set by using metal formers of different sizes.

A sharp rotating blade cuts the coils to produce a series of short tufts.

They stop the process briefly to give us a look inside.

At the same time, the wires run in grooves around rotating rollers, and those yarn tufts now become trapped between the two wires.

Together the wire and yarn tufts then travel over other rollers into a device called a flyer.

The flyer was invented for twisting yarn.

Each time the flyer rotates, it inserts one turn into the pipe cleaner.

Bobbins then wind up the pipe cleaner.

It all happens so fast, it's a bit of a blur.

At the next station, numerous bobbins of pipe cleaners unwind simultaneously.

They travel between a series of rollers.

The rollers straighten the pipe cleaners, eliminating the curl created when they were wound onto the bobbins.

A clamp then locks the pipe cleaners in position, and a carriage pulls them forward.

The carriage moves in measured increments so a guillotine-style blade can cut the pipe cleaners to a precise length.

In this case, it's 6 inches, a popular length for the craft market.

The machine ejects the completed pipe cleaners, and a worker packs them up for retail.

Each bag contains all the colors of the rainbow and then some.

For thicker, fluffier pipe cleaners, they use a slightly different machine.

Bobbins of polyester yarn rotate in the carousel to wind the yarn around the former and coil them.

A sharp rotating blade cuts it into tufts.

A carrier wire is used here to keep the pile under tension, after which the two core wires trap the tufts just as before.

Another clamp twists the core wires and tufts as it pulls them forward.

This transforms them into one thick and fuzzy pipe cleaner, which is then cut to any length the client orders.

Production now focuses on pipe cleaners for medical and engineering cleaning jobs.

Heat guns melt the fibers at the ends to seal them, ensuring they won't shed lint or fibers during the cleaning of sensitive equipment.

You can see the difference this makes in the pipe cleaner on the right.

Pipe cleaners today are no longer just for pipes.

They're used to clean all kinds of things like bicycle gears or any gear at all.

They can also be used for paint touch-ups, odd jobs in the garage, cleaning rifle barrels, wrapping electronics cables, and cleaning any long tube.

But, of course, it's not all work and no play.

There's always arts and crafts time.

That's when things take a creative twist and pipe cleaners become anything you want them to.

Stilton is a creamy and crumbly british blue cheese whose roots date back to the early 1700s.

It tastes mellower and less salty than many other varieties of blue cheese.

Always produced in an 18-pound cylinder format, it has veins of blue mold radiating from the center outward.

The production of stilton is strictly regulated.

Only half a dozen dairies in the world located in three specific english counties are licensed to produce it and only from locally produced pasteurized milk.

It takes 20 gallons of milk to make each 18-pound cylinder of stilton.

They begin by pouring milk in a vat.

Next, they add starter culture, laboratory-grown natural organisms.

Then they mix a blue mold culture called penicillium roquefort with distilled water and add this to the milk, as well.

After about three hours, they stir in enzymes that coagulate the milk fat.

After about 90 minutes, workers run a wire knife through the now-gelatinous milk, separating the fat, called curds, from the liquid, called whey.

Then, overnight, they drain the whey out of the bottom of the vat.

The next morning, the firm curds go through a mill, which breaks them up into a crumbly consistency.

Workers weigh out portions of 24 pounds, each of which will become an 18-pound cylinder of cheese.

After adding salt-- the company won't disclose just how much-- two workers gently hand-mix the portion, two different mixing styles blending the ingredients more thoroughly than one.

Then they funnel each portion into a cylindrical plastic cheese mold called a hoop.

The curd still contain whey.

So workers stack the hoops for five days.

Typically, cheeses are pressed to drain the whey-- not stilton.

Here gravity does the job.

The cheese drains under its own weight.

Workers flip the hoop once daily to drain through both the top and bottom.

After five days, they remove the hoop.

The cheese, now drier, stands on its own, while, with a knife, they perform a critical procedure called rubbing up.

They rub the entire surface with a flat blade, sealing all the holes so that air can't penetrate and cause premature internal mold growth.

Now the cheese goes on to a stillage, a type of trolley, and begins its journey through the climate-controlled bluing rooms, named for the color of the internal mold growth which occurs there.

Workers flip the cheese daily to prevent its cylindrical shape from distorting under its own weight.

Within a week to 10 days, grayish white, sometimes orange, naturally occurring mold begins growing on the outside, and from that point on, when the cheese acquires a certain amount of mold, they move it to the next level room, then to the next one, and so on.

At about the five-week mark, they mount the cheese on the turntable of a piercing machine.

With each press of a foot pedal, the turntable rotates slightly, and long, stainless-steel needles pierce the cheese.

These tiny holes permit oxygen to enter and kick-start the penicillium roquefort blue mold culture that the dairy put in the milk earlier on.

Before long, blue mold gradually grows from the center of the cheese outward.

To monitor the extent of the blue-mold growth, the dairy's cheese graters draw samples using a tool called a cheese iron.

The iron reaches all the way to the core of the cylinder.

When the sample shows that the bluing runs right through, the cheese is ready, more or less.

The timing's actually a bit tricky.

Stilton is a relatively young cheese, best eaten between 12 and 14 weeks.

The dairy does its best to coordinate shipping so that the cheese is at its optimum quality when it reaches the customer.

Therefore, it ships 8- or 9-week-old cheese to local stores and 7-week-old cheese to international customers so that the blue stilton will be an ideal 8 or 9 weeks of age when it arrives at its destination.

Smart meters are electricity meters that don't have to be read by a person.

Instead, they wirelessly send your home's electricity use to your utility in real time.

Your bill then shows how much electricity you used and when, making it easier to better control your energy use.

Old technology meters require a human being to take a meter reading once each billing period.

Smart meters can report consumption in real time by wireless transmission.

Inside the smart meter are three different electronic circuit boards, the brains of the unit.

They're built on large, blank fiberglass panels.

One panel yields six or eight identical circuit boards depending on the meter model.

In the first machine, for tracking purposes, a laser etches a serial number for each future circuit board.

The next machine applies a stencil on the pattern of the components to be mounted on the board, then spread solder and paste form across it.

The board now wears solder paste shaped in position exactly to receive the upcoming components.

The next machine's two lasers verify that the solder paste application is perfect.

Depending on the size of a specific circuit-board component, there can be anywhere from 5 to 20,000 of them stored on a tape reel under a transparent, protective strip.

Workers mount the rail for each component on what's known as a pick and place machine.

This computer-controlled high-speed device peels back the protective strip and picks the required parts off each reel, then places them in their designated solder-pasted position on the board.

Bulkier components are stored on a different-sized reel, which workers mount on another type of pick and place machine.

It does the same operation as the previous one, only slower due to the larger-sized components.

The boards now travel through a soldering oven.

The precision-controlled temperature, peaking at 468 degrees fahrenheit, melts, then cools the solder paste, fusing all the components to the board.

Next, each board undergoes testing.

This machine applies electricity to ensure each and every component meets specifications.

When the board gets the all clear, it moves to the next machine, which cuts it into separate circuit boards.

Meanwhile, robots assemble the meter's digital display.

They take a plastic half-circle housing and install a liquid crystal display into its rectangular window.

At the next station, a robot uses a vision system to align snaps to attach a circuit board to the liquid crystal display.

Assembling the meter body begins with a plastic base plate.

The first station prints a serial number on the bottom.

The next station then flips the base plate upright and installs the components of the remote disconnect switch.

This switch enables the electric company to switch power on and off from any location.

A switch cover closes up the base.

The protruding wire will connect to a circuit board.

The next station installs two terminals through the switch cover.

These function as part of the switch operation as well as part of the meter's measurement of electricity consumed.

Once those terminals are in, an automatic screwdriver secures the switch cover.

Now the first of three circuit boards.

This one, the metrology board, measures energy consumption.

The unit comes off the automated line, and a worker completes the assembly.

He attaches a connector to the digital display circuit board, installs the display, then connects the switch wire to the display's board.

The metrology board sends its measurements to the display circuit board, which interprets the data and sends it to a third circuit board, which transmits it by radio frequency to the utility.

Once workers have fully assembled the housing, they install a metal tamper-evidence seal.

Every meter undergoes rigorous final testing.

An automated station verifies the display using a vision system.

It checks that the remote disconnect switch operates properly, that the meter measures electricity accurately, and successfully transmits and receives messages.

The telescope was invented by a dutch optician four centuries ago.

Before that, it was believed the earth was the center of everything.

The theory that it actually revolved around the sun was discounted.

In the hands of italian astronomer galileo, the telescope brought reality into focus.

Modern telescopes are light-years ahead of those early versions, and through their eyepieces, the universe continues to unfold.

A reflecting telescope bounces and concentrates light with mirrors.

Production begins with the machining of cylindrical metal parts.

These are baffles, and when screwed together, they'll block stray light that would interfere with the telescope's operation.

More tools transform a solid aluminum disk into a ring with spokes.

This part, called the spider, is a framework for supporting the telescope's secondary mirror.

After coating the metal parts with a protective oxide, they plunge them into a vat of black dye.

The dye soaks into the oxidized pores and seals the surface of the parts.

Next, this molded disk of thick low-expansion glass will become the telescope's primary mirror.

A diamond-edged tool rotates on a calculated tilt to make the glass slightly concave.

To improve the concave profile, a worker coats the glass with abrasive.

He adds a weight to a precisely curved cast-iron disk and spins it.

The weighted iron disk bears down on the abrasive coated glass to fine-tune its curvature.

A worker then examines the finely ground surface for scratches, and using a calibrated gauge, he measures the radius of the disk to confirm that the concave profile is precisely what it needs to be.

The glass now spins while a cylindrical cutter aims dead center to cut out a hole.

This center hole is sized to accommodate the baffles we saw earlier, and it will also enable the mirror to be held securely in the telescope.

Next, the glass disk oscillates as an automated tool rubs a compound against it to polish it.

A worker then applies some of the compound onto a polishing disk and works the surface of the glass against it repeatedly.

This hand polishing improves the surface considerably.

In the laboratory, a technician compares the primary mirror glass to a grid to verify that the dimensions are accurate.

He aims a laser at the glass.

A computer analyzes the reflected light.

If the angle is off by 1,000th of the width of a hair, the telescope's image could be blurry.

The glass is now ready for its mirror finish.

They lock it facedown in a vacuum chamber.

They add small amounts of titanium oxide, silicon monoxide, and aluminum.

They close the chamber, tightly encasing the contents, and then pump out most of the air, creating a partial vacuum inside.

They activate a 6,000-volt electrode.

This sparks a glowing discharge of ions onto the now rotating glass disk.

These ions blast any lingering contaminants from the glass to give it a serious cleaning.

They heat the aluminum, titanium, and silicon pellets, which evaporate into a cloud of vapor.

Atoms condense landing on the surface of the glass to form a glossy mirror surface.

It takes just minutes for this highly reflective coating to be applied.

This telescope mirror is now ready to reflect light from the stars and planets in the sky.

Next, a technician screws lights into the metal housing for the primary mirror.

He adds a mount mechanism for the eyepiece, complete with knobs for focusing.

He flips over the assembly and slides the precision-made mirror onto the housing.

A cork ring cushions the mirror so a retaining ring can be installed without a scratch.

The telescope's primary mirror is now secure to the housing.

He pieces together the three-part baffle, then screws it to the lens holder protruding from the center of the telescope mirror.

He joins the baffle and mirror assembly to the telescope tube.

The tube has already been equipped with a secondary mirror that will bounce reflected images from the primary mirror back for magnification and viewing.

It's taken about six weeks to build this telescope.

And now it's ready to help unravel the mysteries of the universe.


Today on "how it's made"...

Yogurt...

Candles...

Neon signs...

And book bindings.

Your mother probably told you not to put anything with germs in your mouth.

Well, it turns out she was wrong.

Yogurt is one of the healthiest foods you can eat, yet it's chock-full of germs--  bacteria, to be precise, bacteria that are actually good for your digestive system.

The first step in making fruit-flavored yogurt is to inspect the fruit.

Workers discard any skin or pits that slip through and any pieces that are discolored or bruised.

The fruit doesn't go into the yogurt as is.

First, they turn it into jam.

To give the jam just the right texture and taste, they have to weigh all the ingredients carefully before pouring them in the mixer.

The first ingredient is water, followed by artificial and natural flavoring, and stabilizers to give the jam an even consistency.

Certain types of fruit aren't colorful enough on their own, so the factory adds artificial coloring.

Next comes two types of sugar--  fructose and sucrose.

The mixer heats everything to 140 degrees fahrenheit to help dissolve the dry ingredients.

The machine pumps out and refeeds the mixture so that it blends evenly.

Then more coloring, followed by the fruit, followed by another hour or so of heating and mixing.

Then they heat the jam to a minimum of 176 degrees fahrenheit for another hour to kill off any harmful bacteria.

To prepare the yogurt, they mix different powdered milk products with milk and cream.

For low-fat yogurts, they use fat-free milk and skip the cream.

Once they've blended the ingredients, they heat them to 176 degrees fahrenheit or higher for just 30 seconds.

That's all the time that's needed to pasteurize the mixture.

While it's now bacteria-free, there's another problem.

Milk and cream naturally separate because cream is lighter due to its fat content.

So on to the next step, homogenization-- blending the milk and cream together.

The homogenizer's pistons crush the fat globules.

This enables the two liquids to merge.

The mixture then goes into fermentation tanks heated to 113 degrees fahrenheit.

Workers pour in a packet of live bacteria bought from a factory that breeds bacterial cultures for the dairy industry.

Fermentation takes 6 to 20 hours depending on the style of yogurt.

The factory manufactures the yogurt containers right on the packaging line using plastic sheets and paper labels.

The machine heats the plastic and molds it into containers.

A split second later, it wraps the containers in paper labels.

You can view that dual operation best from underneath the machinery.

Now they fill the containers with the combination of yogurt and fruit jam.

To protect the yogurt from contamination, the air in this part of the machine is strictly controlled and filtered.

The bacteria in the yogurt is what's known as good bacteria, the type naturally present in our intestines.

They produce a compound called acetaldehyde.

That's what gives yogurt its distinctive flavor.

The red dots are electronic sensors that verify the fill level.

The container covers are made of thin but strong aluminum.

First, the sheet of covers passes upside down over a printer which stamps on the expiration date.

Unopened, this yogurt will stay fresh for more than 40 days.

Then the sheet of covers turns right side up to be heat sealed onto the containers.

Finally, the machine automatically divides the containers according to whatever pack format the factory is producing.

The invention of the candle can possibly be credited to ancient egyptians, who dipped reeds into animal fat and lit them.

Today's wax candles provide a romantic atmosphere, light when there's power failure, and, when blown out, a grand finale to a rousing rendition of "happy birthday".

At the heart of every candle is a wick made from woven or twisted cotton cord.

To stiffen up that limp cord, they run it through a tank of liquid paraffin, a wax derived from petroleum.

The cord then passes over a cooling drum whose cold surface instantly hardens the wax coating.

The now rigid cord winds onto a spool, ready to be cut into wicks.

There are several candle-making methods, all of which work on the simple principle that hot wax turns hard and white when it comes into contact with cold air or a cold surface.

This process is called candle pressing.

The hot paraffin travels from the holding tank to a set of sprinklers inside a 20-foot-high refrigerated chamber.

The sprinklers shoot the wax upwards into the cold air.

Like falling precipitation transforming into snowflakes, the wax droplets transform into wax flakes.

They land at the base of the chamber, then travel to a hydraulic press.

The press forms them into candles, using pressure but no heat, and pierces a hole through the middle for the wick.

The air in this part of the plant has to be less than 77 degrees fahrenheit, or else the flakes will melt and stick together, jamming the machine.

Now the candles travel to the wicking machine, which cuts and inserts a wick into each candle.

Another candle-making method is the dipping process.

They install 96 wicks on each frame of an automated dipping machine.

One after another, the frames dip the wicks into a tank of clear paraffin.

As the frames rise from the tank, gravity pulls the wax downward, creating a conically shaped coat of wax.

By the time a frame has made the circuit and returned to the tank, the wax coat is hard and white.

The wicks go for a second dipping, followed by another go-round.

This continues until 25 dips later.

The tapered candles are .

8 of an inch in diameter.

To turn these white candles into colored candles, they dip them into a vat of dyed paraffin...

Then immediately after into cold water to harden the color coat.

To produce votive candles, the factory uses an automated molding process.

They heat each molding table, flood it with paraffin, then cool the table.

The wax overflow compensates for the shrinking that occurs during the 20-minute hardening phase.

Once the wax hardens, they scrape off the excess and remelt it to use for the next batch.

A pin inside each mold created a channel for the wick.

Now another type of automated wicking machine inserts a wick and secures it in place with the metal clip at the base of the candle.

They make certain specialty candles on a manually operated dipper rather than by automated machine.

These altar candles are made of paraffin and 66% pure beeswax, as required by vatican law.

To create their cylindrical shape, the worker has to flip the frames after every dip to equalize the wax.

It takes 90 dips to build a 3-inch diameter.

The candles still come out slightly tapered, so they go through a heated die to adjust their shape.

No longer just a staple of religion, ritual, or romance, today's candles are a hot decorative item.

Neon signs are made of glass tubes bent into letters or shapes and filled with inert gas.

When the electric current hits the electrodes in the tubes, electrons flow through the gas, making its atoms glow.

The type of gas and glass determine the color of the light.

In a clear glass tube, argon gas gives off blue light while neon gas produces red light.

To create vivid designs, they can parlay those two base colors into more than 80 additional colors by using glass tubes that are colored with fluorescent powders.

For instance, blue glowing argon gas in a yellow tube creates a green light.

To shape the tube, they use a glass-blowing technique.

Following a pattern drawn on a fire-resistant sheet, they mark where they have to bend the tube.

Then they heat each spot on a device called a ribbon burner, whose propane flame is a blazing 1,200 degrees fahrenheit.

Within half a minute, the glass softens enough to be pliable.

They gently bend the tube, then blow into the uncorked end to restore the tube's original diameter.

With each bend, they check the shape against the pattern, every so often pressing a wooden block along the tube to equalize the width.

Argon gas emits steel-blue light, but this blue-colored tube will change that to dark blue.

After shaping, they cut off the excess and rub the coloring powder off the ends.

Now they can attach these glass casings, which contain electrodes.

They fuse an electrode to each end of the tube using a propane hand torch and a flexible latex blowing tube.

They seal the glass around one electrode but leave the other one open.

Then, using what's called a crossfire burner, they create a tubulation, a thin tube with a bubble that will act as a passage way into the open electrode.

They fuse the tubulation to that electrode...

Then carefully inject a drop of mercury into the open end of the tubulation.

Argon gas needs a touch of mercury to brighten the color it emits.

Neon gas doesn't.

Using what's known as an end torch, they fuse the open end of the tubulation to a long glass tube leading to a pumping system.

They connect the electrodes to the system, then power it up.

The pump vacuums out the air, then injects the gas.

The electrical current makes the atoms in the gas glow.

To trap the gas inside the tube, they use the crossfire burner to remove the tubulation and seal off the open electrode, making sure the drop of mercury has descended into it first.

They dip the back of the sign into black paint.

This will make the lettering or design stand out.

They use a brush to spread the coat evenly and remove the excess.

Next, they'll light up the sign at high voltage for a half hour.

This will dry the paint and, more importantly, transform the liquid mercury into vapor that spreads throughout the sign.

Using transparent clips, they mount the sign onto a black plexiglas background to make it stand out even more.

Finally, they connect the protruding electrode wires to a transformer.

This transformer converts the standard 110-volt current from our electrical outlets into high-voltage current, into the 3,000 to 15,000 volts you need to light up a neon sign.

Hardcover books have bindings made of heavy paperboards covered with cloth, leather, or plastic.

Soft-cover books have flimsier paper bindings.

While bookbinding on a commercial scale is all mechanized today, you can still find craftspeople who skillfully bind books by hand.

Book bindings date back to second-century egypt where christian monks sewed sheets of papyrus together, then enclosed them in leather-covered boards connected by strips of hide.

Monks in medieval europe stitched together handwritten parchments, binding them between wooden boards often covered in leather.

Sometimes they were embellished with gold leaf and gems.

The 16th century saw the arrival of cheaper printed books with simple pasteboard bindings.

Today, commercial bookbinding is highly mechanized.

The process starts with large sheets of paper, each containing several consecutive pages of the book.

A worker positions a stack of each sheet into a machine appropriately called the guillotine.

Its sharp blade drops down and chops off excess paper.

After trimming, the stack moves into a machine called the folder which folds each sheet into book size with the pages in the right order.

As we see here in slow motion, the machine starts by perforating the fold line.

Then the sheet moves along the conveyor belt until it hits the stopper to the far right.

That stop position aligns the perforation between two rollers.

Watch in slow motion how those rollers pull the page down, pressing a neat fold.

This process repeats itself for each fold of the sheet.

The result of all that folding is what's called a signature, a unit of pages in the correct order but still attached to each other.

A book is made up of several signatures.

Another machine now assembles them in the right sequence, along with the cover, for binding.

There are many different binding methods.

This one is called wire stitching.

As we see here in slow motion, the machine drives heavy-duty staples right through the spine of the signatures and cover.

The staples are cut from steel wire that's so strong, you have to tear the book apart to remove them.

Here's another slow-motion look at the stapling action.

This is another binding method called perfect binding.

First, a scanner ensures the pages are in order.

Then the covers go on.

With traditional bookbinding, they sew these components together.

In the perfect bind process, they glue them together.

To do that, the machine first feeds the assembled books, spine side down, onto trays.

The trays compress the pages.

Then a saw underneath cuts off the folds, detaching the pages from each other along the spine.

But that cut creates a smooth edge to which glue would have difficulty adhering.

So a second saw notches the spine, creating a rough, glue-friendly surface.

The notched spine now runs over rollers that coat it in hot glue.

Finally, two conveyor belts merge-- one with the book's pages assembled with the notched and glue-coated spine, and the other with the book's cover.

The machine presses the cover onto the spine.

The book now travels along the conveyor belt for another 30 seconds, during which time the glue air dries.

By this stage of the process, with either binding method, most pages on the unbound sides of the book are still attached by folds.

To separate the pages, the books go through a machine called a three-knife trimmer.

It cuts the folds off the three sides simultaneously.

The book is now finished.

Fine-quality books still have some bindings.

But your average book today is wire stitched or perfect bound.

Those newer methods are far less costly, yet still produce books that are sturdy and durable.


Aluminum Boats
Alpine Horns
Luxury Watches

The first aluminum boat was launched as a simple skiff in the middle of the last century.

Fishermen loved the lightweight hull because it could be pulled in and out of the water more easily than the wooden boats of the day.

Decades later, aluminum boats have gone high-end, but they still have that lightweight appeal.

Since aluminum hulls aren't as heavy as other types, these boats will go farther on a tank of gas.

They make them from high-grade aluminum that's corrosion-resistant.

Rollers flatten the metal, and a blade called a slitter cuts it to length.

A computer-guided router then makes precise cuts to produce parts that will fit together perfectly, like this bracket to reinforce the stern.

They cut the boat's larger components with a computerized plasma torch.

It can cut a wider path than the router.

They transfer the cut parts to a pallet.

This is the boat's bottom panel.

A long piece of aluminum will be the gunnel, which is the upper edge of the hull.

They bend it around a wooden template to give it the correct curvature.

Next, they reinforce the bow with an extra plate of aluminum to withstand pounding waves.

They brace the other end with numerous stiffeners and screw them into place.

The screws act as a clamping system, until the parts of the boat can be permanently attached.

A line of caulking helps waterproof the seam between the hull and the back of the boat, called the transom.

Again, screws hold everything together, as the painstaking clamping continues.

They join the two sides of the bow and hold the ends together with a vise grip.

This strip of aluminum will act as the spine of the bow.

It's called the brace plate.

More screws tack it into position.

They attach the sides to the rest of the hull.

Now they drill hundreds of holes along the seams and plug them with rivets.

They extract the clamping screws and fill their holes with more rivets.

They install the gunnels on the rim of the hull.

And now it's time for the tank test.

They lower the boat into a tank to confirm that it's watertight.

If they find any leaks in all those rivets, they'll make the necessary adjustments.

They spray foam into the bottoms and sides to keep this boat afloat in the event that something punctures it.

And then they rough up the surface to allow paint to better adhere.

They move to the interior and install felt on the storage panels to give them a more finished look.

Then they lay the carpeting port to starboard.

Next comes the plastic fuel tank.

All they have to do is connect the fuel-line hoses and secure them with a stainless steel collar.

The dash panel fits onto the front.

It's pre-wired, so they simply connect it to the boat's main wiring harness.

Next, they apply lubricant to the motor's propeller shaft.

This allows the propeller to slide on easily.

They tighten it with a pneumatic ratchet.

Then they hoist the motor onto the stern and bolt it into position.

With the luxurious interior now complete, this metal boat bears very little resemblance to its utilitarian predecessors.

This particular model doubles as a fishing boat and a pleasure craft.

And it proves that aluminum boats are no longer just a basic form of transportation.

The alpine horn dates back some 2,000 years to the celtic tribes that inhabited the northern slopes of the alps.

Traditionally, mountain dwellers blew the horn to announced daily activities, such as round-up time for livestock.

As modern communications reached those altitudes, the horn's role became strictly musical.

an alpine horn's sound travels about 5 miles, thanks to the instrument's length and shape.

Following a centuries-old tradition, the horn maker harvests spruce at a specific time in the lunar calendar, when tree wood is supposedly most resonant.

Once the spruce logs dry out, which takes at least nine years, he saws them into planks.

Then he traces and cuts out the shape of the horn's curved bell twice-- once for each half.

He measures and marks how much wood he must hollow out with his drill press.

It's tricky because from top to bottom, the bell's inside cavity progressively widens and deepens.

Next, he runs glue along the perimeter of both bell halves, then joins them with a sheet of newspaper in between to prevent a permanent bond.

He'll have to pry them apart later to finalize their shape.

Once dry, he tears off excess newspaper, traces the circumference of the bell's top and bottom openings, then measures and draws the bell's shape between those two openings.

Once again, following the lines he drew, he cuts out the shape.

To check his work, he uses a series of sizing templates.

He lines them with charcoal, then slips the first template onto its designated position at the top of the bell.

The charcoal marks any wood that he still needs to shave off.

He repeats this procedure with each template, working his way down until the bell is rounded to the proper external dimensions.

Now for the bell's internal dimensions.

The horn maker detaches the halves.

He scores a line running the length of the bell half on each side.

This marks the inner-wall thickness he's going to create.

Using a grinder with a rough grit abrasive, he wears away the wood right up to the score lines.

The holes he made earlier tell him how deep to grind.

Then he switches to a finer grit abrasive to grind the walls down another millimeter.

He checks his work with a measuring gauge, then glues the halves together again, this time permanently.

The horn maker constructs the bell's other section in halves, as well, rounding them off on a lathe.

He coats them in glue and wraps them in rattan.

The rattan solidifies the structure somewhat but is primarily for decoration.

Once the glue dries, he'll glue aluminum connecting dowels to each section.

These will enable the musician to assemble and disassemble the horn parts.

The bell is truly the alpine horn's showpiece.

Horn makers typically embellish it with painted scenes or motifs.

This horn will boast a colorful bouquet of traditional swiss flowers.

Fully assembled, an alpine horn is between 10 and 13 feet long-- the length determining the pitch of the instrument.

Musicians use lip movements to modulate the vibration of the air column inside.

Different vibrations produce different notes.

throughout most of the 19th century, the wristwatch was a piece of jewelry worn by women.

Men carried pocket watches.

It was during the boer war in 1899 that british soldiers decided fumbling around for a pocket watch during battle was a serious waste of time.

The tools of the trade haven't changed much since pocket watches ruled the day.

In this swiss workshop, the mechanisms are meticulously handcrafted, just like they were centuries ago.

The watchmaker starts by polishing parts to a mirror finish.

He mixes his lavender and almond oils with a diamond paste.

He extracts a part called the cage from its storage solution, sets it in the paste, and polishes it against a zinc block.

He brushes the dust off the cage with a soft piece of wood.

Another watchmaker polishes its edges, removing tiny bits of material so other parts can fit to it.

The technician attaches gears to the cage.

These gears are the balance and escape wheels.

He fixes the gears on tiny rubies because they don't wear down easily.

The second half of the cage completes this mechanism, called the tourbillion.

Invented in 1789, these rotating gears in a cage counteract the effect of gravity on timekeeping for more accurate results.

The watchmaker now magnifies the assembly and projects the image onto a screen to confirm that the gears and levers are interacting correctly.

Next, he secures a wound-up spring in a barrel.

This is the main spring that powers the gears of the watch.

He dips a pin in some grease and uses it to lubricate the spring.

Then he caps the mainspring with a cover and tamps it down with a special tool.

He carefully positions the barrel in its slot on the main plate.

The watchmaker now installs another series of gears on the main plate.

They'll transfer power from the spring to the tourbillion.

He attaches the bridge to the gears to act as a pivot as they turn.

Another spot of grease keeps these wheels turning efficiently.

With the spring barrel and its transmission gears assembled, production now reaches a critical moment.

He places the mechanism in a holder that makes it easier to install the tourbillion.

It's a tricky job.

The cage must be precisely positioned for its gears to receive power from the spring.

He now transfers the mechanism to another holder to insert the winding stem.

Next, he engraves the circular pattern onto a bridge plate.

This high-end finish is called perlage.

The technician attaches the textured bridge to the dial side of the watch.

He assembles more gears and a numbered wheel to the bridge.

These gears will provide the date information for this timepiece.

Another bridge secures the gears that lead to the date wheel.

He fastens it with tiny screws.

He slides the second date wheel onto its axle and checks the setting mechanism.

We'll have the up-to-the-minute details as this watch gets a beautiful face.

Even in the age of digital and electronic wristwatches, the mechanical watch has an appeal that's timeless.

Some are among the most complex in the world and can cost in the six-figure range.

At that price, time is truly a luxury.

In a factory nestled in the scenic swiss countryside, a highly-skilled team has assembled the inner workings of a luxurious tourbillion wristwatch.

Now a watchmaker fits the handcrafted face onto the mechanisms.

Using a special tool, he presses the hands onto an axle at the center of the watch.

This enables him to set the time and date.

The watch will be encased with 18-karat red-gold bezels sealed against the elements with rubber rings.

He now fastens the middle casing to the mechanism, then completes the installation of the winding stem and crown.

The watchmaker lubricates the bridge for the auto-winding system, then engraves a parallel-ribbed pattern onto it.

This adds visual interest to the bridge, making this luxury watch look good inside and out.

After the bridge has been set with jewels, it's ready to be installed at the center of the watch, where its jewels will keep parts from rubbing against each other, causing wear and tear.

An artist now engraves the rotor that's to be attached to the bridge.

It's this part that will automatically wind the watch.

It's a signature piece that can reflect the customer's individual taste.

This stylish-looking rotor is now ready to be secured to the bridge.

Once installed, even the slightest movement will cause this rotor to oscillate, and that action winds up the mainspring of the watch.

The watchmaker now shields this timepiece with a glass dome and then vacuums dust from the next gold bezel.

He carefully cleans this clear sapphire window because even the tiniest speck of dirt could cause the watch to fail.

He snaps the front bezel onto the watch, then, using a special device, he presses the bezel to secure it.

This action also squeezes the rubber ring between the bezel and the watch to create waterproof seal.

This watch will now be water-resistant to a depth of nearly 330 feet.

The back casing screws into place so it can be removed for maintenance work during the life of the watch.

Using a special tool, he tightens the casing to just the right tension.

He then inspects the watch to confirm that the rotor moves freely within the case.

Next up is a computer analysis of the mechanism.

A device holds the watch and simulates wrist movements, while the computer evaluates its accuracy.

that's the sound of a minute repeater, which is a feature on some models.

When triggered, it chimes the time.

And now this watch takes the plunge into a container of water.

If bubbles appear, it would signify a leak.

But there are none, so this watch is waterproof.

This incredible watch will set you back $150,000.

But it will be an heirloom piece that stands the test of time.


Cast Iron Cookware
Biodiesel
Clothes Hangers
Stone Wool Insulation

Cast-iron cookware is renowned for its superior ability to retain heat and diffuse it evenly.

Bare cast iron, however, requires regular oiling to ward off rust-- not so with enameled cast iron.

A glass-enamel coating encases the iron, making the cookware entirely maintenance-free, forever.

Since 1925, this french company has been producing enameled cast-iron cookware.

Its high-end products are renowned for their thin walls, which makes it the most lightweight cast-iron cookware available.

The secret-- the mineral levels in the iron recipe.

At the foundry, they begin with pig iron, which has high carbon content.

Then they melt in a calculated amount of steel to further boost the carbon level.

The melting oven heats the metals to 1,520 degrees celsius, liquefying them in just 45 minutes.

Workers add a powdered chemical to agglomerate the natural impurities in the iron, then scoop those bonded impurities out.

Meanwhile, workers mount a two-part mold template onto a machine which produces the sand molds with which they'll cast the cookware.

The machine injects the sand mix into the templates.

The mix contains clay, water, and proprietary ingredients which makes the sand compact well.

Compaction is critical because just one single grain of sand displacing from the mold would produce a flaw on the cookware.

It's essential that the pouring temperature be precise and consistent, so they transfer the iron from the melting oven to a temperature-maintenance oven.

From there, they pour the molten metal through a mere 1/10th-of-an-inch gap between the mold halves.

The process is entirely automated because the pouring angle and speed are critical.

The molten iron cools and solidifies in 20 minutes.

Then the molds drop onto a vibrating mesh conveyor.

The shaking releases the cast cookware from the mold, along with the metal that solidified in the flow channels leading to the mold cavity.

The cookware moves into a closed chamber where a high-pressure gun blasts the surface with steel balls to remove all remaining grains of sand.

At this stage, the cookware has rough excess metal where the two parts of the mold met.

So now workers smooth away these burrs using a grinding wheel on the outside...

And a grinding pin in the tight spots.

The cookware is now ready to be prepped for enameling.

A machine now blasts the entire piece with steel grits, making the surface texture uniform so the enamel will adhere evenly.

The first coat of enamel is strictly to protect the cast iron and prevent it from rusting.

Enamel is a form of glass.

However, this enamel is engineered to be flexible because metal cookware naturally expands as it heats and contracts as it cools.

After a trip through a dryer, the enamel goes into an oven at more than 1,500 degrees fahrenheit for about 45 minutes.

During this firing, the hair-thin enamel coating becomes translucent.

The second coat of enamel completely seals the porous surface.

It's made of some 20 components, including enamel chips, pieces of clear glass, and pigment powders for color.

An automated spray system coats the inside first.

Workers wipe the edge to prevent the piece from sticking to the conveyor, then the handle because they'll paint that a different color.

They spray the handle manually, then the automated system coats the rest.

The iron recipe contains a high level of the mineral silicate, which helps the enamel adhere well.

Once again, the cookware goes through the dryer, then into the oven at more than 1,500 degrees fahrenheit for about 45 minutes to vitrify the enamel.

Once the cookware cools, it undergoes a final visual inspection, the last of 30 quality-control checks throughout the production process.

Enameled cast-iron cookware lasts for generations because it doesn't warp over time and remains food-safe for life.

Biodiesel is a more eco-friendly diesel fuel that's made from vegetable oil or animal fat.

Unlike regular diesel and gasoline, producing biodiesel doesn't require petroleum.

Instead, the raw materials are locally available and can be recycled from waste.

If your car has a diesel engine, it can run on biodiesel fuel, usually without requiring any modifications.

While biodiesel and petroleum diesel are similar in energy efficiency and fuel economy, biodiesel is more eco-friendly.

For starters, it can be made from what would otherwise have been waste-- for example, from vegetable oil from the kitchen of your local fast-food joint.

The restaurant simply discards its used fryer oil in a receptacle out back.

Every few days, a vacuum truck comes by to collect it.

In its current state, the oil contains water and food particles, making it unusable for biodiesel production, so the truck transports it to a filtering plant.

There, they pump the oil into a holding tank, then heat it up to draw out the water.

Once they drain the water, the oil is ready to enter a multi-stage filtering process.

First, the oil goes through a vibrating sieve which strains out the larger pieces of debris.

After this first filtering, the oil is already visibly cleaner.

Next, it passes through a second vibrating sieve.

This one has a finer mesh.

Therefore, it catches smaller particles of debris.

After this second stage, the oil looks clean but still contains microscopic debris, so it enters the third and final filtering stage-- passing through 20 ultra-fine filter cloths which trap any particle larger than one micron in size.

A micron is about 80 times smaller than the width of a human hair.

The captured debris leaves a muddy residue on the filters.

That vegetable oil, which once deep-fried potatoes, is now ready to cook up some diesel fuel.

Another source of oil for making biodiesel is beef tallow--  oil derived from cow fat.

Biodiesel producers typically buy tallow from facilities like this one, which specialize in cleaning cow hides for leather tanneries.

Sharp, revolving blades shear off the fat from the back of the hide.

The fat drops onto a conveyor, which moves it into a steam-injection cook tank.

The tank heats the fat to a gentle boil, extracting the oil.

Everything else leaves the tank and drops into a waste container.

The oil moves onward, passing through a two-stage filtration process.

Whether the raw material is vegetable oil or beef tallow, the biodiesel producers refer to this main ingredient as feedstock.

When the feedstock arrives at the biodiesel plant, it goes into a holding tank until production time.

This demonstration illustrates the production recipe.

They take the feedstock and combine it with methanol, a type of wood alcohol, as well as with a catalyst, which triggers a chemical reaction.

A processing unit mixes everything thoroughly while applying heat and pressure.

The resulting chemical reaction produces a harmless byproduct, glycerin, a common ingredient in soaps and cosmetics.

Processing consumes much of the methanol.

Then they remove even more, leaving just a tiny percentage of it in the finished biodiesel.

To ensure their fuel meets international regulatory standards, the plant's quality-control lab samples from each production run.

In this flammability test, they heat the fuel to 275 degrees fahrenheit, then apply a flame to see whether the gases ignite.

If they do, they have to remove more methanol to make the fuel safe.

If they don't ignite, the fuel meets international safety standards.

Biodiesel costs more at the pump, but emits significantly less carbon dioxide and monoxide and 85% fewer cancer-causing agents into the air we breathe.

Until the mid-1800s, people folded or laid their clothes flat or hung them on hooks or pegs.

Once it became more common to store clothes in a wardrobe, someone-- historians don't know exactly who-- invented the clothes hanger, a hanging device shaped like human shoulders.

Since the mid 19th century, hundreds of inventors have patented various shaped hangers, many of which are still being produced today.

This czech company makes wooden hangers in several styles.

It uses beech, a hard and durable type of wood.

The damp logs air-dry outdoors for seven months, then go into a kiln for three to four weeks.

Drying the wood is critical.

Otherwise, the hangers would expand and contract with temperature changes and eventually crack.

Workers first use a band saw to slice the logs into 2 1/2-inch-thick planks.

Then they put each plank through a broaching machine.

Inside, a toothed blade planes the wood, rendering the top and bottom surfaces level and smooth.

Next stop is a grinding machine which contains abrasive belts.

Workers feed the planks into the machine one at a time.

As each plank passes through, the belts above it sand the tops silky smooth.

When the plank exits the machine, workers flip and refeed it to smooth the other side.

An automated saw cuts each plank in half...

And trims the halves to a specific dimension.

The now-smaller planks go into another grinding machine which sands the sides smooth.

Now the hanger shaping begins.

Workers stack 10 planks and, using a circular saw, cut them to the same length, the ends at a 60-degree angle.

They mount four planks at a time on a milling machine and cut a tongue-and-groove profile on the edges.

They'll later connect the hanger parts by fitting the tongues into the grooves.

Stacking six planks now, they trace a hanger-shaped template on the top surface, then carefully follow the trace line with a jigsaw.

Each plank is now roughly shaped into a half a hanger, which they call a lamella.

This particular hanger is designed for dresses, so they mill a groove in the shoulder of each lamella for garment straps.

Then an automated milling machine refines and finalizes the hanger's shape, smoothing the roughly cut wood in the process.

Next, with strong cabinetmaker's glue, they coat the tongues and grooves of two lamellas, then fit them together on a press.

They let the glue dry for a day, then saw the point off the top.

This creates a flat area into which to insert the hanger's hook.

There's already a hole for it there, made when they milled the tongue-and-groove profile.

Next, they sand the joint to remove excess glue and smooth out any nicks or tears in the wood.

Then they round the angular joint.

To seal and protect the wood, they now spray the entire surface with varnish.

When it dries, they do a rough sanding, then apply a second coat and let that dry.

Many customers want their logo printed on the hangers they order.

The printing machine coats a logo-embossed rubber pad with ink.

A sponge dabs the pad, then stamps the logo onto the hanger.

Finally, the hanger's iron hook-- it's either nickel-plated for a silver tone or brass-plated for a gold tone.

Workers position the hook.

Then a press rams it into the wood 4/10 of an inch deep.

The hook has screwlike threads at the base which grab and lock into the surrounding wood.

For certain models, the factory stains or paints the wood prior to varnishing it.

After all, many people like their clothes hangers to make a fashion statement, too.

An erupting volcano led to the invention of stone wool insulation a century and a half ago.

It was observed that volcanic lava could be whipped into woolly tufts by prevailing winds.

Soon, this was being replicated in factories to produce stone wool for insulation.

Shaped into batts, stone wool insulation can be tucked snugly between the studs of a framed wall.

It acts as both a thermal and acoustic insulator.

And here's the soundproofing proof.

In this demonstration, an activated alarm goes into a box lined with stone wool.

When the lid is closed, the sound is contained.

And when it's lifted again, the annoying sound is back.

They make stone wool from basalt rock and slag recycled from the steel industry.

The process is fueled by coke, which is a form of coal.

Basalt rock is solidified lava formed when rock melts underground and then quickly cools.

After the rock has been partially crushed at the quarry, a loader scoops it onto a screen to separate the bigger pieces from the fine particles.

The particles will be processed into briquettes, which can be used in the production of stone wool, along with the bigger pieces of rock.

The rock and briquettes, along with the steel slag, melt into lava in a furnace.

Temperatures reach 2,700 degrees fahrenheit-- as hot as a volcano.

A spinning machine whips the lava into thin stands of stone wool in a process that's like making cotton candy.

The strands form tufts, and a little binding solution holds them together.

A spray of oil adds water repellence.

Now a fleecy web, the stone wool rides a conveyor to the factory's upper level, where it spills into a huge pendulum device.

The pendulum swings to and fro to layer the stone wool in a zigzag pattern.

The number of layers varies, depending on the kind of insulation being made.

The now-layered stone wool travels between rollers that compress it substantially, adding density to the wool.

Automated pushers tuck in the pack on each side as the wool enters a long oven.

The heat cures the binder applied earlier, allowing the compressed fibers to hold their shape.

The now-tighter pack exits through a cooling zone and travels under a roller which squeezes it to make the fibers more flexible.

Circular blades then slice the moving mass of stone wool lengthwise.

A branding tool burns the r-value and company name onto the surface of the insulation as it moves forward.

Robotic arms swing back and forth to slice the insulation to its final dimensions.

Instead of sharp, steel blades, these robots use high-pressure water jets to make their cuts.

The jets do a precise job without generating dust or waste, and the stone wool doesn't absorb the water from the jets.

The sheer density of the wool makes it moisture-resistant, along with the oil added to the fibers during spinning.

To demonstrate stone wool's water-repellent qualities, they pour water directly onto the surface.

There's no absorption.

The water just runs off.

In this routine test, a worker torches the wool, and it doesn't catch fire.

Stone wool can withstand temperatures of almost 2,200 degrees fahrenheit due to its natural properties.

It's even cool to the touch on the other side.

Once it's passed several quality-control tests, the insulation heads for the packaging line.

Grippers pull on a roll of plastic tube packaging, and hot jaws cut and seal one end to form an open bag.

Mechanical fingers hold the other end open as machinery slides it over a metal spout.

A compressed stack of insulation is pushed into the spout.

The spout expands, and the insulation is released into the bag.

The spout then retracts, and the process is repeated.

Machinery heat-seals the open end.

From a pile of basalt rock and recycled steel slag to a bag full of insulation, it's been a wild and woolly ride.