Which North American automobile plant...

[ocnblu]

... does the most complete job of building a car or truck? Meaning the largest percentage of manufacturing the parts, then putting the parts together to make the vehicle. Or is that an outdated concept? Just curious.

[AxelTheRed]

Probably Ford's Dearborn plant. Spring Hill is pretty complete, but I don't think AS complete as Ford's.

The factories that did that were generally built before the companies all merged together, but by now most of them are gone...Dodge Main, Buick City, Chevrolet Manufacturing.

Personally I think its a better way than to have all the components built all around the country, then shipped to one location. It sounds more efficient.

Edited November 26, 2007 by AxelTheRed

[Dsuupr]

It would seem to be better for the environment to do it that way.

[PurdueGuy]

Probably Ford's Dearborn plant. Spring Hill is pretty complete, but I don't think AS complete as Ford's.

The factories that did that were generally built before the companies all merged together, but by now most of them are gone...Dodge Main, Buick City, Chevrolet Manufacturing.

Personally I think its a better way than to have all the components built all around the country, then shipped to one location. It sounds more efficient.

We don't really know how they're setting up Spring Hill, so it may be more of a "used to be" as well (unless you know something I don't).

Building stuff at the plant sounds more efficient, until the exact same engine or whatnot is needed in cars built in five different plants across the country, in which case economies of scale can play in favor of a centralized assembly plant for major components.

[91z4me]

Ford's Kentucky truck plant (makes the SD trucks) has its own sheet metal stamping facility on grounds, and I think things like steering linkages and other stuff on site as well.

[AxelTheRed]

We don't really know how they're setting up Spring Hill, so it may be more of a "used to be" as well (unless you know something I don't).

Building stuff at the plant sounds more efficient, until the exact same engine or whatnot is needed in cars built in five different plants across the country, in which case economies of scale can play in favor of a centralized assembly plant for major components.

I guess Spring Hill is more of a "used to be" now.