Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Solingen was famous, but I don't hear it much now.
I've been to the small city of Solingen, located in the Rhine-Ruhr industrial zone a short distance southeast of Düsseldorf. Solingen is still a manufacturing center for several dozen companies with thousands of employees that make all sorts of knives, scissors, swords, razor blades and other steel cutting instruments for consumer, industrial and medical businesses.
Solingen is an interesting city to visit with a lot of history. It is also one of the few cities in Germany with an electric powered trolley bus network, which has overhead power lines for the buses, sort of like streetcars or light rail. They have some good museums to visit in town telling about the development of the knife, sword and blade industries. A lot of it has to do with close access to high quality steel makers and metal workers of the Rhine-Ruhr industrial region of Germany.
Superior steel. Does the US (is that what you mean by "we'?) even have a steel industry anymore? Germany is known for quality in a number of spheres: precision machinery, to name another.
The US is the 4th largest producer of steel in the world.
The US is the 4th largest producer of steel in the world.
Then why did it rebuild the San Francisco Bay Bridge with cheap Chinese steel, with Chinese rivets that began to give way soon after installation? Why doesn't US engineering use US steel?
Then why did it rebuild the San Francisco Bay Bridge with cheap Chinese steel, with Chinese rivets that began to give way soon after installation? Why doesn't US engineering use US steel?
US steel is not unaffordable, we export millions of tons of it each year.
Gov officials are just cheap asses, under the guise of "saving tax payer money", yet ignore several warnings about the contractors and steel they were using, and even now, play obtuse to report after report regarding poor quality issues.
The gov will go out of its way to cut costs on such a large, important and complicated peice of infrastructure, but think nothing of dumping billions of dollars into road to no where social programs and business subsidies, and billions for the awful high-speed rail.
Also, this is just part of the bigger picture; people who think that it was a good idea to open up such trade with countries like China, thinking the US will ever maintain an advantage over a country that has little employee rights and environmental controls, in addition to currency manipulation of direct government support, yet call it "fair trade."
I accidentally tested my Finnish hunting knife in the shop by stabbing myself - bled everywhere. Was definitely a sharp knife!
Well at least you tested it on yourself, not like that fellow in the Swedish IKEA store a few years ago.
I don't think the Germans know more about knife making, their branded knife companies just have a long history of quality production. At a price - you get what you pay for. Other nations could make superior blades if they chose to, and some actually do, but most knives on the market are made with affordability as the top priority, and that's why most people have crappy knives in their kitchens.
By the way, Fiskars scissors were all I would purchase, even had two different kinds of Fiskars pruning shears, but they (Fiskars) eventually sold out and switched their manufacturing to China and now I won't touch their product. Such a shame.
Don't worry, I sliced myself in the thumb with my cheese slicer. The emmental got a bit of colour to get on with it.
Done that too, took a little chunk of flesh off my knuckle. Come to think, I have a terrible track record with cutting implements.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Apparently, our own steel is unaffordable to us for much besides military uses. City and state budgets go for imported steel to save money.
