Ford Motor Company’s Michigan Truck Plant Body Shop Now Features Flexible Manufacturing

Ford Motor Company has announced that they shall be investing $300,000 in a 240,000-square-foot, flexible body shop expansion at the Michigan Truck Plant in Wayne, Michigan.

"This has been a tough, but gratifying year in manufacturing for Ford. We've transformed our plants to bring more products, faster to our customers," said Matt DeMars, Ford vice president, Vehicle Operations. "Our goal is to build stability and standardization into our North American assembly and stamping plants, which is what flexible and lean manufacturing is all about."

Ford has had a wonderful year in terms of sales and productions. Plus, they have launched a record number of vehicles the previous year and would like to sustain the rhythm for 2005. They are now doing well in trying to meet their previously stated commitment of infusing flexible manufacturing into 75% of its body manufacturing shops, trim and final assembly operations by the end of this decade. Flexibility in the body shops is the most crucial component of flexible manufacturing due to the complexity and the cost of the operation involved. Ford’s innovative flexible body shop system requires less expenditure than both time-honored methods of traditional body shops and other devised flexible manufacturing systems.

With lasts year’s successful sales and production, Ford is hard pressed to surpass the impressive numbers they have previously posted. At the start of 2004 Ford launched an onslaught with production of the F-150 at the Dearborn Truck Plant; the Ford GT at the Wixom Assembly Plant; the Escape Hybrid at the Kansas City Assembly Plant; the Ford Five Hundred, Freestyle and Mercury Montego in Chicago; the Mercury Mariner at the Ohio Assembly Plant; and the Ford Mustang at AutoAlliance International. Ford plans to be just as aggressive to maintain if not surpass the same numbers as the preceding sales year.

DeMars credits their highly successful launches to the Ford Company’s focus on quality; their well planned processes and to their manpower. The people behind the manufacturing of their vehicles are the heart of the whole operation. "We are committed to getting our launches right. We know that a strong launch is critical to a vehicle's success," he said. "The Ford Production System, our Launch Quality Operating Systems and our Safety Leadership Initiative are important tools in our manufacturing system."

The aforementioned Michigan Truck Plant produces the Ford Expedition and Lincoln Navigator. This particular plant employs more than 3,000 hourly employees. The addition of the flexible body plant will certainly expand the production capabilities of the plant. Details on future products that maybe produced on the truck plant will be announced at a future date.

"This is an extremely exciting time for this plant and for the employees here," said Gary Johnson, plant manager. "It reinforces to everyone our future, the long-term viability of the Michigan Truck Plant and our workforce. The new body shop expansion and flexible tooling give us a strong future with the capability of producing exciting new products."

This will also enable the Ford Motor Company to adjust with the ever changing market and do so at record speed. Plus, aside from being able to react more quickly they could also do this with significant cost savings. This is also in accordance to the company’s dedication to its commitment in producing more products at a faster rate.

With today’s ever changing needs and demands every company needs to be on its toes at all times. Any dilly dallying may cost dearly. Many auto manufacturers have been in hard work devising plans and methods on how to cope up and yet cut costs. These way customers are happy and manufacturers may still churn out profit.

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