Hexagon a leader in manufacturing intelligence solutions explains briefly the automotive production process and key engineering and data challenges facing global producers.

1. Automotive
Manufacturing
Processes
Overview
Tal Vagman
Directory Product Strategy
* Animations and images courtesy of Porsche, VW, GM, Ford, Renault

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Background – Automotive Product Life Cycle
• New Vehicle Program
• Concept selection
• Go ahead / Abort
• Detailed design & specifications
• Development and tooling
• Manufacturing line commissioning
• Preproduction & Launch
• Ramp up and Mass Production
• “Face lift”
• Product retirement
• Recycling
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2-3 Years Target

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Key Car Components (real-life example from Renault)
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Key Manufacturing Process – High Level
• Sheet Metal Stamping
• Closure subassembly
• Body in White Assembly
• Paint shop
• Body Assembly
• Final Assembly
• Powertrain & Chassis Fitting
• Inspection & testing
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• Interior parts production
• Dashboard assembly
• Powertrain Production

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Stamping
• body panels, doors, hoods, floor pans and other parts are stamped out of sheet metal
• Fully automated transfer presses cut out blanks from the metal sheets.
• Laser welding consists in assembling metal sheets each having a different thickness or strength, into one part.
• Dies are used in heavy duty stamping machines to shape the metal, trim excess, bend edges and pierce holes.
• Once the production volume is complete, the Die set are changed to switchover to the next batch.
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Various Stamping Process Operations – Animated Example
Blanking: Cutting Piece of Sheet Metal into pieces
Trimming: Cutting excess metal off the part
Stamping: Stretching the flat Blank into product
shape
Piercing: Punching necessary holes, slots in part
Flanging: Folding the edges of the part to make it
functional, hides rough edges, provide surface for
fastening

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Hundreds of Unique Sheet Metal form the Carbody
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Body Shop & Assembly Lines
• Hundreds of parts from the press shop are assembled and welded to form the car body in a highly automated process.
• Continuous line divided into preparation and subassembly lines (Closures and other subs) and main assembly line for the
Body
• About 80-90 stations with around 700 robots handling 2500-5000 weld points & seams.
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BiW Assembly Process – Animated Example

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Paint Shop
• Completely automated stage which consists of many processes.
• The vehicle body is attached to a conveyor transferring it from one operation to another.
• The body is first cleaned to a achieve a pure surface
• Several layers of anti-corrosion, primer and paint are applied using baths and paint robots.
• The body enters a drier before a layer of transparent paint is applied
• Final dry-off of the body before Light-tunnel inspection and wax
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Painting Process – Animated Example
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Powertrain & Chassis
• Engines, gearboxes and chassis systems are produced while the car body is going through the other processes
• Engines are built up from cylinder head, camshaft, crank case, and other subassemblies, then the built-up unit is fitted out
with peripheral items like the exhaust manifold, flywheel and injection pump.
• Chassis systems, complete with braking, suspension and transmission subsystems, are put together as well
• Once completed, the Powertrain and chassis systems are transferred to the vehicle assembly line for fitting.
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Final Assembly & Wedding
• Continuous line of more than 100 stations handling large number of variants using JIT
methods.
• lower automation level compared to other departments - 90 % human
conducting ~ 4000 operations
• Involves fitting out the finished car body, with seats, wheels, engine, dashboard, etc.
• Some parts come from nearby supplier plants while others travel from afar.
• The climax of the assembly process is the wedding of the engine, drive and body.
• As the wheels are mounted, the vehicle rolls into the testing area, either under its own
power or on a belt.
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Final Assembly Process – Animated Example
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Automotive Challenges and need for Quality Inspection and Process Control
• Sheet Metal parts are mostly flimsy free form objects
• A Car is assembled of thousands of parts which have strict dimensional requirements
• Deviations and deformations stack up quickly and cause assembly problems
• Production dimensional stability is hard to maintain with various production, materials, supplier ongoing changes
• Shortening Launch and time full production takes an increasing priority for successful New Model Launches
 Inline Dimensional control and automated quality solutions provide both critical 3D data collection and analysis tools to
address these issues throughout the automotive life cycle.

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