I do have many years of experience in product design for companies. So as a design team leader it has been necessary to work with good document control. Companies organize with a scheme that accommodates any and all products they may want to produce and support in the field. The documentation strategy is applied wholesale to everything produced. The process is documented and published and everyone from the buyer to the shipping clerk is bound by it. I didn’t invent this. It’s how things happen in the business world.
The watercraft may be small, but this is a real manufacturing company that is starting up. Many different designs may be produced. Some of the parts may be interchangeable. So there’s a need to manage all products professionally through a complete product lifecycle. Otherwise it’s only a matter of time until chaos strikes.
I can’t account for what other companies do. We will be outsourcing some cutting work to vendors like the one you describe. They will follow our organization. We impose it, not the vendor who does the cutting. Maybe the folks you’ve worked with are thinking of their kits as a unitary product and each kit is entirely unique? I’m guessing . . .
Without using blocks for parts, how would you keep track of parts and assure interchangeability across designs and coordinate multiple designers working on different projects? I’m really open to whatever works.
This typical thing that happens is that companies adopt CAD and don’t see the data monster they are creating. Then chaos strikes and it gets really expensive and then someone who understands PLM and the need for it is called in to fix it. My approach is to avoid rather that to ignore it and deal with consequences later.
I love simplicity and want to reduce everything to the most basic form. Show a better way and I’ll take it. What I’m suggesting is a more formalized and universal version of what Maxz suggested for his model aircraft above. All companies that are staying ahead of the curve have some sort of PLM in place. What I am suggesting may not work for everyone. But it’s what we need. It’s like what my product engineering work has demanded for decades.