Purpose

In this activity, you’ll research an item you use every day in order to understand how
this item is made and what it takes to get the item to you.

Process
Choose an item you use in your daily life. Research the raw materials needed to make
it and how these raw materials come together to form the finished product. Also
research what kind of transportation is used to get the final product to you.

Your research will specifically answer the following questions:

1. What are the raw materials needed for this product? Where are they found?

2. What are the steps involved in making this product? Where does each step in the
production take place?

3 What energy is needed to produce this item? Where does that energy come from?

4. What kind of transportation, if any, is needed at each stage of the production

process, including getting the finished product to you?

The product which I have chosen is “Toothbrush”.

Toothbrush is one of the most significant oral cleaning devices. Everybody has their own toothbrush, which
would as a rule be supplanted no less than like clockwork. This implies toothbrush is in a tremendous
interest universally. There are a large number of toothbrushes being made and transported ordinary.
Assembling of toothbrushes overwhelms a huge piece of vitality use. Transportation, reusing, and disposing
of toothbrushes likewise identify with vitality utilization. In spite of the fact that toothbrush is a little item,
its creation scale is stopped huge. Considering vitality that is exemplified in the existence pattern of
toothbrushes maters on the grounds that the cycle from assembling to disposing of toothbrushes requires a
lot of vitality, which could be decreased through better plans. Beginning from the materials that are utilized
in assembling toothbrush, I experienced various phases of its life cycle,, for example, fabricating,
transportation, use, reusing, and squander the executives. I discovered that most vitality is expended in the
cycles of assembling, transportation, and reusing

Production and Transportation:

The initial phase in the assembling cycle is the development of the toothbrush's plastic body. Plastic pellets
are warmed up and constrained through a metal cylinder into the toothbrush molds. In a fluid express the
liquefied plastic is held set up in the shape until it cools and turns into a strong, plastic toothbrush.

Toothbrush shares the same as transportation method with other the small products. Since there is not
specific information about energy consumption of transportation of toothbrushes, I am trying to approach
this problem in a general way. According to Dr. Jean-Paul and Dr. Claude, “Almost all transportation modes
depend on a form of the internal combustion engine, with the two most salient technologies being the diesel
engine and the gas turbine, since they are the lynchpin of globalization” (Jean-Paul, Claude) It indicates that
toothbrushes are shipped in the same way—in vehicles powered by fossil fuels. “Gasoline produces around
46,000 Btu per kilogram combusted, which requires from 16 to 24 kg of air” (Jean-Paul, Claude). That
means one ton of gasoline could produce about 13,000 kilowatt-hours. The most energy consuming shipping
method is maritime shipping, which most likely used by transportation of toothbrushes since most of
toothbrushes are made in China and needed be distributed across ocean to western world. According to The
Geography of Transportation Systems website, a normal size container ship will use 225 tons of fuel per day
when it’s traveling in a normal speed (45km/hour). If there was a ship transporting toothbrushes from
factory in China to USA, it would travel at least 11,572kms and take 10 days. The ship would consume
2,250 tons of fuel and 2.9x107 kilowatt-hours would be used.

PRODUCTION STEPS IN MAKING OF TOOTHBRUSH:

• Molding the handles

• The filling machine

• Trimming the bristles

• Packaging the toothbrushes