Voith Turbo in Crailsheim Enhances Its Production Structure
22 November 2007
The goal is clear: by improving its delivery reliability, reducing production times and increasing flexibility - Voith Turbo intends to further enhance its customer focus. To achieve this goal a new plant development plan has been created. Based on this plan, by 2009 the Crailsheim plant in Germany will become a state-of-the-art production facility - with improved processes and optimized logistics to ensure its competitiveness for many years to come.
Currently, Voith Turbo in Crailsheim is undergoing a major restructuring of both its production and logistics operations. By combining improvements to its production halls, its production process and its working environment, the company expects to significantly raise product quality levels while reducing its delivery times. This proves that Voith Turbo can effectively respond to its customers' demands for faster as well as more flexible production.
The implementation of the plant's new development plan is now running at full speed. In this year alone, new assembly and testing facilities for the Vorecon and WinDrive products will be finished. In October, the product segments covering universal shafts and drive components will be incorporated into the plan. In addition, the existing production processes will be adapted with respect to new Voith product types, sizes and higher performance standards. For example, in the past 30 Vorecons were assembled, tested and painted each year, in a 600 m² facility. But in the future, one Vorecon will be completed each week, in a new 2,000 m² facility. Thanks to this increased production capacity, Voith Turbo will be able to satisfy its customers growing requirements for higher order volumes, dimensions and weights. Plus, a new color scheme has been designed for the production halls which will improve the transparency of the plant’s processes as well as promoting a uniform corporate identity.
Logistics is another area where Voith Turbo intends to set new standards. Both the internal and external logistics at the plant will be incorporated. And successful principles from other industries, such as continuous assembly, kanban principles, and one-piece-flow techniques, will also be introduced into the plant's new production concept. Plus, the plant's material supply-chain will be improved through the use of a new receiving system and a rough parts warehouse. Due to these improvements, supply-lines will be shortened, bottle-necks will be minimized and overall through-put times will be reduced by 20%. "Our customers will clearly benefit from this new development plan," adds Dr Jülrgen Zeschky, Managing Director, "thanks to our shorter and more reliable delivery schedules - especially during peak production periods."
But it's not only Voith customers who will benefit from this restructuring: Voith employees will see improvements too. That's because the plant's development plan also includes improvements to the working environment, better work safety and the use of standardized work stations. Other examples include modern, ergonomically designed assembly lines as well as new break-areas and office buildings, which were designed by experts who incorporated the ideas and experiences of Voith employees. As a result, the plant's development plan promises to ensure both the competitiveness as well as the job security at Voith Turbo in Crailsheim.
