A12
Politics & The Nation
EZ RE
KLMNO
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 26, 2010
Love the new-car smell? Automakers don’t.
No scent pleases all, so they try to keep things in neutral
BY DEE-ANN DURBIN
detroit — When engineers were getting Ford’s Transit Con- nect ready to go on sale in the United States last year, some of them noticed an oily, fishy smell in the van. Ford employees in Turkey,
where the Transit Connect is made, were stumped. They hadn’t noticed the smell. But a team of U.S. engineers did, and they went to work stripping down the van’s interior until they found the culprit: a sealant used in the doors. Ford switched to a sealant that won’t offend Ameri- can noses. In the highly competitive auto
industry, no detail can be over- looked. That includes odors. Ford, Toyota, General Motors
and others have trained teams of sniffers who evaluate smells and then reject or reformulate any unpleasant materials. It’s a daunting task: Car interiors are made of dozens of different odor- ous materials — plastics, foams, rubbers, carpet, fabric, leather. “The goal is for you to not
smell anything, because differ- ent people are going to like different things,” said Sandra Edwards, a Ford laboratory engi- neer who leads a smell-test team at the automaker. “If there’s no scent whatsoever, everyone’s go- ing to be happy.” Edwards knows this firsthand.
Whilemany people like “new-car smell” and even try to replicate it with air fresheners, she dislikes it and drives with her windows rolled down until it dissipates. Smell tests have taken on
added importance with the glo- balization of the car market: Different cultures have different sensitivities. Ford’s smell panel has international participants to ensure it gets a variety of opin- ions. “America has such a sanitized
atmosphere to it, it doesn’t take much for us to pick up on those odors,” Edwards said. Andrea Sterling, an engineer
and smell-panel leader for Toyo- ta in the United States, said Americans are more sensitive to “fishy” smells than Japanese, so Japanese engineers have been trained to meet American stan- dards for “fishiness.” On the other hand, Japanese testers found the smell fromsome natu- ral fibers much more offensive than Americans did. There’s no smell that Edwards
can think of that everyone likes. U.S. and European drivers think leather smells luxurious, for ex- ample, but Indian drivers don’t like it. Smell tests are run whenever
engineers need to make sure a certain part can be used. At Ford, five testers are picked from a pool in Edwards’s department, and they smell samples that have been placed in Mason jars with water or heat, which intensify smells.Testers assign numbers to the smells, fromone (no smell) to six (strong and disturbing). Negative tests can force engi-
neers to scrap a part and start over.When Toyotawas designing the new Sienna minivan, engi- neers planned to use a certain foamblock as a dampening cush- ion in the cup holder. But the foam didn’t pass the smell test, so materials engineers worked with design engineers and the supplier to find an alternative. Sometimes, automakers or
suppliers will try to reformulate the part to change the odor. In one recent instance, Ford’s team determined that some rubber
“If there’s no scent . . . everyone’s going to be happy.”
—Sandra Edwards, Ford engineer
floor mats smelled unpleasant. The supplier tried adding cinna- mon oil tomask the scent.Unfor- tunately, that was rejected, too. “It smelled like cinnamon and
rubber. It was pretty comical,” Edwards said. Sterling said many people be-
lieve that automakers add some- thing to the car to create “new- car smell.” But it just comes from chemicals in the materials. Plas- ticizers, for example, are chemi- cals added to plastic to make it more durable and easier tomold into the dashboard and other shapes. Eventually, the chemi- cals evaporate and the smell goes away. “Even the smell of roses comes
fromthe chemicals that the plant releases into the air,” Sterling said. “Just like roses, plastics, adhesives and other materials have some chemicals in them that are released into the air and are recognized by our noses.” The Ecology Center, an envi-
ronmental group in Ann Arbor, Mich., has warned that exposure to the many chemicals in car interiors—through touching the seats or steeringwheel, for exam- ple — may cause health prob- lems. In tests, the center has found bromine, a flame retar- dant that it says has been linked to thyroid problems and de- creased fertility; phthalates, which also have been linked to reproductive problems; and lead. Toyota has some concern that
the chemicals in cars may cause nose and throat irritation, Ster- ling said. Currently, there are no U.S.
regulations on the chemicals that can be in a car’s interior air, but the Japanese Automotive Manufacturers Association has set some voluntary guidelines that Toyota follows. Sterling said those guidelines caused the com- pany to switch to some lower- emission products in some cases, such as a resin with 80 percent lower formaldehyde emissions. Ford spokeswoman Kristen
Kinley said Ford tests all its materials rigorously and hasn’t found any harmful chemicals. — Associated Press
Refugees see American dreamdown on the farm BY ALEXANDRA ZAVIS
los angeles — A dingy floral print peels from the walls, and sheets of plastic are taped over some of thewindows.But forHar- kaRai, thesaggingtrailerhomehe bought inruralOregonishispiece of theAmericandream. Rai,whohasawife,a4-year-old
son and another child on theway, was just a boy when new citizen- ship laws forced his ethnicNepal- ese family out of Bhutan. For 18 years, they waited in a refugee camp in Nepal, hoping to return home. “We built a bamboo house,” he
said. “The dust comes inside. The rain comes inside. And when the windcomes,wehangontotheroof to keepit fromblowing away.” Desperate to escape the camp,
Rai, 30, acceptedanoffer fromthe U.S. government last year to be resettled in Boise, Idaho. But by then, thecountrywas inthethroes of recession. Rai applied for jobs as awaiter,
a janitor and a cashier. When his federal cash assistance ran out after four months, he had no job offers. For the first time, Raiwon- dered if he had made a terrible mistake. How would he support his family? That’s when a career adviser
toldhimaboutadairynearBoard- man,Ore., thathires refugees. One day in late 2008, Walt
Guterbock, the 65-year-old live- stock manager at Threemile Can- yon Farms, was listening to NPR on his truck radio when a report caught his attention. It featured refugees who had escaped wars and ethnic strife only to struggle to findwork inBoise. Their plight resonated with
Guterbock, whose parents fled NaziGermany, eventually settling in Chicago. The farm where he works was having a hard time filling vacancies in two milking parlors. “Almost no native-born Ameri-
cans . . . apply for these jobs,” Guterbocksaid. “It’satough,dirty, demanding job.” Mostapplicantswereoriginally
fromMexico, and the Social Secu- rity numbers they provided weren’t checking out. The farm won’thire illegal immigrants. Guterbock, a former Peace
Corps volunteer in Africa, ap- proached his farm’s human re-
sources director with the idea of hiring refugees. “It just seemedlikeagoodthing
to do, besides being good for busi- ness,”Guterbock said.
Where the jobs are In Boise, LanaWhiteford, a 27-
year-old employment specialist with the International Rescue Committee,was struggling to find workfor refugees.Overheryear in the position, she had watched as the officewent fromplacing six or seven refugees in service and fac- tory jobs each week to placing none forweeks at a time. “I had this major gnawing
guilt,” she said. “We had people receive evictionletters.” Whiteford,whogrewupinAna-
heim, Calif., had never heard of Boardman, Ore. Then an e-mail from Threemile Canyon Farms landedinher inbox. She learned that the farmwas a
five-hour drive from Boise. Agen- cies suchas the InternationalRes- cue Committee, contracted by the government to help resettle refu- gees, usually look for jobs that are closer to their offices so they can assist with housing, education and other needs. But these were extraordinary times. So she hired a van and drove 10
refugees to Boardman to take a look. They set off before dawn, traveling through barren fields, thickfogandsnow.Althoughmost of the refugees had rural back- grounds, none had ever seen so many cows. About 20,000 cows are milked
every day at Threemile Canyon Farms, said General Manager Marty Myers. They are housed in half-mile-long barns. Waste from thedairy isusedtofertilize35,000 acres of irrigatedfarmland. The refugeeswere told that the
farmis unionized, salaries start at $9.45 an hour, and health insur- ance is provided. In Boise, they could expect to earn about $7.50 anhourwithnobenefits,andmost jobs arepart time,Whitefordsaid. All but one of the refugees de-
cided to work at the farm. Now, when there are vacancies that can’tbefilledlocally, thefarmcalls Whiteford.
Language barrier Since last year, the farm has
hiredabout 50refugees, allnewto commercial farming and from countries as varied as Iraq,Burma
andSudan. Rose Corral, the farm’s human
resources director, saysmost have proved to be dedicated workers. The main challenge is communi- cation. About 80 percent of the 300-strong full-time workforce is Spanish-speaking, and few of the refugees speakmuchEnglish. The farm offers free English
lessons, but most refugees find they are too tired to study after working 9½-hour or longer days. After a fewmonths, some say they speak better Spanish. The arrival of the refugees fuel-
edfears among theworkforce that the companywantedto replace its Latinoworkers. “A lot of people have been ask-
ing what is going to happen to them now that they are bringing inall these refugees,” saidFrancis- co Hernandez, 40, who has worked in themilking parlors for five years. “I train these workers, and when we have trained them enough, maybe the company will say theydon’tneedme anymore.” On the other hand, some refu-
gees complain that they are passed over for advancement in favor ofLatinos. Farmmanagers say the fears on
both sides are unfounded. They say the refugees are filling a labor gap. Some have already pro- gressed to driving trucks and working inbreeding. “I consider it to be a success
story for both them and for us,” saidCorral,whohas receivedcalls from dairies nationwide interest- edindoingthe samekindof thing.
Small-town life Withinafewmonthsof starting
atThreemileCanyonFarms, some refugees decided to move their families to Boardman, an agricul- tural processing hub on the Co- lumbia River surrounded by bleached fields andwhiningwind farms.Alocal onionplanthas also startedhiring refugees. After showering off the muck
from work, Rai, from Bhutan, gladly shows off his new trailer home’smodern kitchen and bath- room, the computer glowing in the living room and the patch of green lawn where his son likes to play. It is thefirsthomehehasever owned, and it was bought with moneyhe earnedat the farm. “It completely changedmy life,”
he said. —LosAngelesTimes
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