Steel appeal

With so many of our everyday consumer goods — from TVs to telephones, PCs to filing cabinets — made of either plastics or metal it must be borne in mind that these basic materials are, in fact, not so basic.

There are also highly complex decisions about whether such items have certain components made from metals, while others are in plastic. Therefore a discussion of these materials and some of their applications, to highlight key differences, is necessary from a number of perspectives.

Once, an engineering student would 'time serve', spending up to five years as an apprentice, learning and understanding how products were manufactured before turning his or her hand to the complexities of design and material choice.

Today's further education system sets great store by the power of CAD, and the ability to solid model, constructing components and assemblies on screen, and in some cases even 'testing' the capability of the construction.