News From the Auto Industry

In the first phase of the production program in North America–involving 600,000 powerplants per year–the new engines are likely to ‘consume nearly 100 million pounds of secondary aluminum specification alloys annually, more than three times the amount of light alloy used by GM’S Saturn Corp. subsidiary in the finished parts it makes for its aluminum-intensive engines and transmissions in Spring Hill, Tenn.

Located just east of the I-75 expressway, the facility will enable C-P-C to centralize some of the work that is normally scattered out among engineers at corporate headquarters, the GM Technical Center in Warren, Mich., the group’s engine production plants, and outside engineering service and prototype shops.

That word, of course, sounds rather, well, futuristic. And in some regards, Oshawa can be considered a vision of the future that General Motors once had. In 1988, the plant was undoubtedly hailed as part of GM’s bold move into the realm of seriously high technology manufacturing. For example, in the two car assembly body shops, there are 160 automated guided vehicles (AGVs) rolling through the plant carrying cars-in-becoming. There are no traditional conveyor lines. There are some overhead electrified monorail systems. But the floor-based systems follow wires embedded in the floor, they don’t get tugged along by chains. Imagine how that must have looked back then, when the AGVs were shiny new and not showing the scratched decals and other signs of handling hundreds of thousands of vehicles through the years. (There are also AGVs in the truck plant. And, yes, an abundance of robots in both.)

The plant, which is believed to contain around 120,000 square feet of floor space, and is expandable to more than twice its present size, also will be used to some degree to test new manufacturing methods associated with engines. A great deal of new boring, milling, drilling, grinding, rolling, turning, deburring and measuring equipment will be required in the new facility, possibly along with some new concepts in head changing and material handling vehicles.

The new engines will be produced in at least two displacement sizes, and will, join GM’s existing 3.5-liter “Premium V-6″ engines as the only all-aluminum V-shaped six-cylinder engine lines produced in North America. GM will add a 3.7-liter unit to the Premium V-6 product family, so there will be at least four aluminum V-6 engines available to GM’s car buyers after 2003.

Less Than Ideal. According to Eric Stevens, plant manager for the Oshawa Car Assembly operations, the AGVs are a less-than-ideal approach to assembly, especially in the type of lean environment that they are promulgating in Oshawa. Part of the problem is that they’re looking for shorter takt times, not longer, yet because of the nature of the AGVs (e.g., independent vehicles which are finite in number), the takt time is on the order of four minutes, not less than one. Consequently, AGVs drive the need for parallel processes, which can lead to problems with regard to quality and repeatability.