Columbus South doesn’t yet have cobots, said


Tony Sapienza, a Faurecia spokesman. “It’s part of our vision,” he said. “It’s still evolving, getting to that point.”


In the meantime, FANUC robots are being in- stalled on the factory. For example, robots put parts into a machine to test for leaks. Eventually, the plant will employ about 450 people, and bring Faurecia’s area operations to more than 2000 employees. The Columbus South work- ers are being trained to work in a different way. The employees will be manning multiple workstations and monitoring data constantly.


“The interface with the machine is going to be


different,” DeGraaf said. “They need to understand the process between this technology and what I would say is the old technology. The training of the operator is going to be key as well. “In the older manufacturing world, you might react to a defect,” he said. “This is more of a proactive approach. We can monitor the inputs into the equip- ment. If the inputs are starting to go out of spec, that way we can take proactive measures. The other thing that’s very important for these operators to understand is because the data is real time throughout the plant, their input into the system is critically important.” Preventing fl aws is one reason why the plant will have a mathematician.


“He can look at some of the trends in that data,” DeGraaf said. “Maybe a part is starting to get on the high end of its tolerance. How does that impact the rest of the lines? If it’s going to run at the high end of the tolerance, is that going to be an issue continuously? Or is it something we can get back into tolerance?”


Executives also acknowledged the company has a lot riding on Columbus South. “Anytime you go through a launch and you’re in the automotive and commercial vehicle business, there’s a lot of pressure,” DeGraaf said. “The challenge we have is being the lead…globally for Faurecia. We don’t have the resident expertise yet” in operating such an advanced factory. “We’ve got few people and we’re growing that population and growing that capability,” he added. “Once this is up and


FANUC material-handling robots allow components to move safely and effi ciently at Faurecia’s Columbus, IN, plant.


running, we’ll be host to our fellow colleagues to come in and learn about this environment. Maybe they take a portion of it back to their facility or maybe they take all of the applications to their facility.” At future new factories, he said, “They can come in and take our lessons learned and maybe be better than we were.”


67 — Motorized Vehicle Manufacturing 2017


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