Re: One Story Assembly Plant What If?

Posted by Dave Brownell On 2014/6/21 22:43:29

I have been to the BMW Munich plant four times over the past 15 years, but only in the last trip did I take an evening tour that included their vast stamping operation. Treated sheet steel coils come in one end and stamped parts go out to the robot-tended assembly areas and other German plants producing other models. From memory, there are only four huge presses, each four or five stories tall. Across from them are stacks of dies, ready for use and moved by automated overhead cranes. Parts, big and small are made in batches, probably enough to last a week or so in production. Then the dies are changed and new stampings are made. The change-over process may involve one or two humans who mainly watch things move in and out of the presses while the cranes and die movers do their jobs robotically. A die change can take 10-20 minutes, in and out, with one guy to oversee the operation. Imagine how labor intensive auto stamping must have been at the Nash factory in 1939 or Briggs producing metal for Packard, Hudson, Chrysler and who knows what other companies.

Even at the Munich plant, the noise and vibration was significant enough to cause relocation of apartments and houses at least two or three blocks away. Only on the night tours, when things are relatively quiet would the public be admitted. The night quiet hours were negotiated with local authorities so that those residents, three or four blocks distant, could have some peaceful rest. Visitors to the BMW Museum, Welt and Olympic Park apparently don't notice the vibration from the stamping being done a half mile away.

I've been near Ford's Woodside stamping plant, modern as it is, but still out in Nowhere, south of Dearborn. I could hear nothing disturbing. But the noise and commotion that must have gone on in the 1940s and 50s when our cars were being made, must have been significant to the plant's nearby neighbors. But then again, a noisy plant meant people were making money by making cars. There was probably no complaining by the EPA-like authorities for matters involving noise, smells or industrial pollution. Times have changed, workers are much fewer but safer, and the cars with real character have gone away, except for the collectors who appreciate what went into the making of them and the sacrifices made by those who made them.