All eyes are on Detroit as automakers prepare for slow and careful reopening of factories

American factories United States They are bringing Fords, Chevys and Jeeps to life this week as workers install new safety equipment and wake up the machines before high stakes revive the Detroit automakers' plan to launch on Monday.

Ford Motor Co General Motors Co and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV all plan to reopen factories in North America on May 18. The reopening of the American automotive sector. USA This will be a closely watched test of whether workers from a variety of industries can return to factories in large numbers without a resurgence of COVID-19 infections. The performance of automakers will be important to the U.S. economy. United States, since nearly one million workers are employed in the sector.

Ford and GM executives said separately this week that companies have not recorded any cases of transmission of COVID-19 to factories outside the U.S. since adopting new protocols. security. These procedures include mandatory face masks, separation of workers on assembly lines, frequent cleaning of work areas and the requirement for workers to go through temperature monitors and report any symptoms before enter a factory.

Detroit Threes Take Unprecedented Steps To Share Information On Coronavirus Safety Practices And Develop Common Set Of Workplace Standards For Restarts, Working With United Auto Workers, Leaders Said .

"We thought it was essential that we do it together," Gary Johnson, Ford manufacturing and labor manager, told Reuters. "We have never done this as an industry."

Detroit automakers will restart US factories in the United States without periodic worker testing, as they do not have access to sufficient testing capacity, said UAW officials and officials. They will assess workers who report symptoms of COVID-19 or who have a fever discovered by temperature scanners installed at the factory entrances.

"We must continue to press for these tests to be carried out," Cindy Estrada, vice president of the United Auto Workers union, told Reuters. "Unless we have weekly tests to keep sick people out of the factory, there is always a risk."

Adopting new security practices is only part of the job that companies have to do to reopen after an extraordinary two-month shutdown.

WAVE ZERO

At Ford, workers entering prepared factories are part of what the chief operating officer, Jim Farley, calls the "zero wave." The work of Wave Zero employees "is really important to the success of the startup," he said in an interview.

The machines used to build cars and trucks (welding robots, stamping presses, painting equipment, computer controlled metal cutting machines) are designed to operate almost constantly. Restarting requires more than running a few circuit breakers.

Lubricants used in engine machining systems should be checked. Fluid tanks in paint shops must be filtered to detect bacteria and other contaminants.

The aluminum that was in factories waiting to be turned into exterior panels for the company's best-selling F-Series trucks needs to turn into parts within a certain period of time, said Johnson from Ford.

During the shutdown, some Ford workers entered the automaker's collection factory Dearborn, Michigan, to build aluminum parts and apply protective coatings so that the metal does not have to be scrapped. Some aluminum doors were then trucked to the homes of quality inspectors who broke them in their garages to verify that the adhesives had not failed, said Johnson.

Ford has had batch finished vehicles and railroad heads for two months, which means that the batteries can be exhausted. "Now we can ping the vehicle and get a reading, is the battery depleted?" Said Johnson.

Along the assembly lines, skilled workers from the UAW at the Fiat Chrysler Jeep plant in Toledo, Ohio, worked during the shutdown to install shields to separate workers that would otherwise be too close.

At one point, a worker is supposed to install a bottle of liquid to wash the windshield, while another installs the fuses. Now these workers are separated by an orange sheet of plastic coming down from a hanger installed above the vehicle, said President of UAW Local 12, Bruce Baumhower, whose location represents approximately 6,000 workers per hour.

"Our specialized UAW operators worked throughout this outage to develop these types of systems, these types of media and tools," he said.

Car makers are learning daily from their operations in China, which are weeks ahead of the U.S. and Europe in terms of reopening. As the weather warms up, Chinese workers are heating up under their masks and want more breaks, said Farley.

"We have found many hacks," he said. "People put lavender oil on the masks."

0 0 comments

(Report by Joseph White and Ben Klayman in Detroit; Matthew Lewis Edition)

For the latest automotive news and reviews, follow CarandBike on Twitter, Facebookand subscribe to our Youtube channel.