John,
Welcome to the site and thanks for the great description. That is what makes this site so cool! Your first post and you bring a lot with you. I think I can speak for the rest of the members that we would all LOVE to hear more stories about the assembly line process. I would bet if a thread were started, it might quicky even surpass Darren's thread in number of pages. (sorry Darren)
Welcome aboard!
Rick