Clean workpieces or finished products
Little of this can be handed to software today.
This happens in the physical world, so software agents do not touch it. Automation here means robotics and machinery, which is a different market from the one mapped on this site, on a much slower clock.
| How automatable | Barely automatable |
|---|---|
| Kind of work | Physical, manual and inspection work |
| Jobs that do it | 20 occupations |
| Tool categories that apply | None |
| O*NET activity | Performing General Physical Activities (4.A.3.a.1) |
What this looks like on the job
Not our paraphrase. These are real task statements recorded against this activity, spread across the 20 occupations that perform it.
- Check for and remove moisture or contamination in damaged areas and keep areas dry until repairs are complete.
- Demagnetize mechanisms, using demagnetizing machines.
- Clean, oil, or coat system components, as necessary, before assembly or attachment.
- Clean parts, using cleaning solutions, air hoses, and cloths.
- Clean and lubricate parts and subassemblies, using grease paddles or oilcans.
- Clean and lubricate timepiece parts and assemblies, using solvents, buff sticks, and oil.
- Clean and finish patterns or templates, using emery cloths, files, scrapers, and power grinders.
- Prepare all material surfaces to be welded, ensuring that there is no loose or thick scale, slag, rust, moisture, grease, or other foreign matter.
- Rinse coated objects in cleansing liquids and dry them with cloths, centrifugal driers, or by tumbling in sawdust-filled barrels.
- Remove excess solvent, using cloths soaked in paint thinner.
- Grind, sand, clean, or polish objects or parts to correct defects or to prepare surfaces for further finishing, using hand tools and power tools.
- Clean, treat, buff, or polish finished items, using grinders, brushes, chisels, and cleaning solutions and polishing materials.
- Clean and polish metal items and jewelry pieces, using jewelers' tools, polishing wheels, and chemical baths.
- Clean finished lenses and eyeglasses, using cloths and solvents.
- Clean surfaces of workpieces in preparation for coating, using cleaning fluids, solvents, brushes, scrapers, steam, sandpaper, or cloth.
- Clean semiconductor wafers using cleaning equipment, such as chemical baths, automatic wafer cleaners, or blow-off wands.
- Clean and polish engraved areas.
- Clean, finish, and lubricate molds and mold parts.
What we would actually use
Nothing in our landscape addresses this work. That is the honest answer rather than a padded list: this activity needs a person present, or a machine rather than a software agent.
Nothing on this site applies. Automation here is robotics and machinery, a different market on a much slower clock, and no software subscription moves it.
Chosen for the cheapest thing that does the job, not the best funded. Nothing on this site is sponsored, and the full landscape is there when you want to disagree with us.
How people actually do it
No workflow names this activity yet, but these automate the same kind of work, with the prompts to paste and what to keep for yourself.
Who does this work
20 occupations in the O*NET database perform this activity. Each one has a full breakdown of its other tasks.
- Aircraft Structure, Surfaces, Rigging, and Systems Assemblers
- Automotive Glass Installers and Repairers
- Cutters and Trimmers, Hand
- Electrical and Electronic Equipment Assemblers
- Electromechanical Equipment Assemblers
- Etchers and Engravers
- Furniture Finishers
- Grinding and Polishing Workers, Hand
- Helpers--Production Workers
- Jewelers and Precious Stone and Metal Workers
- Molders, Shapers, and Casters, Except Metal and Plastic
- Ophthalmic Laboratory Technicians
- Painting, Coating, and Decorating Workers
- Patternmakers, Metal and Plastic
- Plating Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic
- Semiconductor Processing Technicians
- Timing Device Assemblers and Adjusters
- Tire Builders
- Watch and Clock Repairers
- Welders, Cutters, Solderers, and Brazers
Work that goes with it
O*NET groups these under “Clean workpieces, finished products, or other objects”. In practice they tend to be done by the same person, in the same sitting.
Method. The activity, its taxonomy placement and the occupations that perform it come straight from the public-domain O*NET 30.3 database. The automatability band is ours: we map each of O*NET’s 41 generalized work activities to how much of its output current software can produce, assuming a person still reviews and owns the result. It is a coarse three-way judgment on purpose. A precise-looking percentage here would be invented.