The TESLA Assembly Plant

[YellowRose]

TESLA says this will be how cars of the future will be built...

http://www.youtube.com/embed/8_lfxPI5ObM?rel=0

[Dan Leavens]

Ray thanks for the post. Pretty cool in the robotics principle to mass produce vehicles but glad to see the human element as well in the plants.

[simplyconnected]

Every manufacturer has their own way and each of them have their own Manufacturing Engineering Dept. I guess that is to say, there's more than one way to skin a cat.
Tesla makes a car in, 'three to five days'. Ford would go broke. We make cars in 2-1/2 shifts from beginning to end. Louisville made Bronco and Ranger at 90 per hour while Dearborn made Mustangs at 60 per hour.

The video shows coils going through a 'blanking' process and then a laser-cutting thing. WAY too slow. Ford die-cuts then flex-rolls before drawing and trimming. We make 450 fenders per hour.

Using robots is nice because it can do heavy lifting of spot weld guns (for welding) and material handling but the process is s-l-o-w. Remember, where ever a robot works, people must stay outside of it's reach (just in case). So, loading and unloading a press with a robot requires the press to stop each cycle because suction cup vacuum and blow-off time takes too long.. When people work the presses, they do it 'on the hop' meaning, by the time the ram reaches the top, a new part is already loaded and the operator hits his palm buttons again without the press stopping. Robots cannot anticipate but humans can. If dirt sticks in a die it causes a blemish in the part that must be 'finished'. Humans can detect this right away and clear the problem. Robots might stack thousands of parts before detecting a problem. Bottom line: Someone needs to be there checking the parts all the time. Our QA guys scuff all over a fender using a hand stone each hour just to show high and low spots.

Our Spray Painters open trunk lids and doors to spray paint under and inside. Robots simply do the flat surfaces (front, top, sides, rear deck lid and back panel). I guess you can say that our people fill-in the areas that a robot cannot do (like inside wheel wells). Remember, at Ford, the car is moving the whole time it is painted.

Maybe it's wrong to compare Ford with Tesla because Ford builds 800 per shift in each of Ford's 20 assembly plants. - Dave