BMW 5 series and 7 series manufacture at Dingolfing, Germany

BMW 5 series and 7 series manufacture at Dingolfing, Germany

The BMW factory at Dingolfing produces 1200 cars each day (each 24 hours) and employs 20,000 people.  A car rolls off the production line every 1.2 minutes which is a staggering achievement to witness.    BMW do not manufacture a car unless a customer order has been placed for it, and the customer can modify his/her order 6 days before assembly of his/her car begins!

There is a combination of car models that can go down the same production line at the same time.  So, for example, a 5 series saloon may be followed by a 5 series touring (estate) which may be followed by 2 x 5 series saloons, followed by a 7 series saloon.  

The configuration of options results in the queuing of the specific assemblies for a particular car which may be for one of any number of the different models, above, on the production line.

The factory uses just in sequence scheduling whereby the marrying of, for example, the chassis to the car body happens at a precise second/point along the final assembly production line.   So the 2 principle components (chassis & body) form the header material in the BoM which is the near completed car.

The BMW supply network relies on backwards scheduling, JIT and just in sequence delivery of components/assemblies, combined with a make to order philosophy.  Quantities of JIT parts, given that there is a scrappage rate, will be consumed within that factory to which the parts are being delivered. 

Manufacture of stocks of components & assemblies and flexibility

Presses are used to develop larger stocks of pressed steel/aluminium parts for car bodies.  The parts are distributed to plants within the BMW supply network.  (BMW also produces pressed bodywork parts for Porsche.)

The factory has the largest pressing machine in the automotive industry which presses out a steel or aluminium panel every 2 seconds over a number of operations so the blank flat parts will come into the press and will be gradually formed into the correct shape using successive pressing operations along the length of the multi-stage press.  The press is enormous and shakes the ground when it presses.  Changeover to the next set of pressings involves swapping a bank of massive tools/dies and only takes a staggering 7 minutes.

Identical robots glue, weld and fuse aluminium and steel parts to order and are flexible to generate stocks of the different bodywork assemblies that may be required.

The plant can hence react to the variations in customer demand not only for the products that are assembled within the plant, but also for the other plants in the BMW supply network.

Accurate Inventory

With ~20,000 parts/car, parts need to be in the correct location at the correct time; and with in sequence scheduling, anything other than accurate inventories of component parts would prove unacceptable.

In sequence Scheduling

Each position along the production line has been backward scheduled for in sequence scheduling so that the set of components/assemblies can be put into the car at a precise point along the production line to the minute.

Mature relationships with suppliers

In sequence scheduling requires mature relationships with component and assembly suppliers to the production line.  For example a seat may be need for a particular car and the requirements for that seat may be sent to the supplier 6 hours before that seat is needed.  The supplier then delivers the seat to the production line within this timeframe.

Excellent customer service

The customer can modify his/her order 6 days before assembly of his/her car begins, and the modification can be a change of the motor size, for example, the colour of the car and any or all of the options the customer may require.  This degree of flexibility is quite considerable. 

Design


BMW designs the car model and the manufacturing process in tandem, and uses computer-aided factory layouts during the design process.

Further

The BMW brand includes BMW, Mini and Rolls-Royce and plant at Dingolfing manufactures the all-aluminium body for the Rolls Royce Phantom which is hand finished, and forwarded to the UK for marriage with the drive train. 

BMW has invested in a number of different countries in partnership with countries, for example, in Korea, China and the UK.  A number of different engine types is manufactured at Hams Hall, near Birmingham in the UK.  This setup delivers tax breaks to the BMW group and also recognises the BMW group as a local investor in manufacturing.

Lessons



There are lessons to be learnt for other factories who attempt to use JIT manufacture but generally fail because the representation of stock on the computer systems does not reflect reality which means that overstocks are rife to compensate for this inaccuracy, and component shortages halt production.  This situation has occurred in many of the companies this reviewer has worked in and seems to be a fundamental flaw in the use of ERP within manufacturing industry to the degree that it is not possible to rely on the just in time/sequence  that has been achieved by BMW.

Just in sequence is not just about lowering stocks, but is also about reducing waste re components that may become redundant if stocked in excess of demand.

To witness a car coming off the production line every minute given that that car can be a different model on the production line with completely different configurations is testament to BMWs achievement in minimising the cost of manufacture, waste and component storage for its set of luxury cars: 5, 6 and 7 series.

Darren Upton
Trip and write-up funded by Darren Upton

http://www.bmw-plant-dingolfing.com/

what is the population of the world?

Football League Cup Final 1970-71: Empire Stadium, Wembley (Att:- 100,000)
Tottenham Hotspur 2-0 Aston Villa

I remember it well - worst day of my life - I don't like football - but the memory of seeing 100,000 people for myself struck me.

So how many people are there in the world? Apparently 6.93 bn at the moment. I can't get my head around that many so I'm going to try another way.

One of my favourite expressions is "I am a grain of sugar in a very big bag", so my thought today is, how big is the bag?

I couldn't find a good photograph of the spurs vs villa match, but instead, I've a photo below of the Live Aid concert at the old Wembley stadium, 1985:

80,000 people.

So for each of the 80,000 at Wembley that day in 1985, including the ego of Bono, and the dubious justification for Bob Geldoff setting up the concert, I'm replacing each person with a grain of granulated sugar - sugar not sand. So the stadium becomes, for practical purposes, empty.
So now I pick up all the grains of sugar and "pour" the grains into a teaspoon.

About 2 heaped teaspoons, in fact, for 80,000 people**.

So how many people are in the world. Well there's the around 5 million people per bag of sugar (standard 1kilo bag of granulated). The world's population of 6.93 bn is in fact 1,386 bags, or 11 bags x 11 bags x 11 bags, giving us 1 huge bag of sugar! The human race:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8eKnYdSGMQ

Source:British sugar, each grain is 0.2 mg.  Each heaped teaspoon is 7 g

Universe is a fractal

UNIVERSE IS A FRACTAL - Pt. 1: Introduction

Determinism (fate)
The problem with free will
I argue that I have free will, and can demonstrate free will by trying and by choosing. In order to try and to choose, I need to think, and in order to think, time must pass, because thinking is a process; thinking is a verb, not a status. In order to think and get to B from A, A must exist. "A" may be conscious or subconscious, but my thought has an origin regarding its assembly. Significantly, as I am never aware of the assembly of my thoughts, I cannot control or select them. I do not control my ideas either. Ideas appear in my conscious mind in the same way. I perceive that I am in control, but I am not in control.

http://itunes.apple.com/gb/artist/matthew-black/id288362060

Why did you press that?

My "control" of my body is a perception
I am not in control because I cannot control or select the reasons for my thoughts, choices and actions. The reasons here are outside of me or originate from within my subconscious.

You and me
Ordinarily, I am not aware of my body as I walk. My body balances itself, moves and avoids obstacles without my “controlling” it. Here, I perceive that I control only a part of my body: part of my brain.

I see you, and my body ordinarily moves to shake your hand. My subconscious deals with the process, the approach and the shaking. You fall over on your way to me. My body corrects its trajectory, and it helps you up. You did something unpredictable or “random”, and I accommodated it. I am not controlling my thoughts (q.v.) and my thoughts operate my body: my story cannot change because I’m not telling it: it is being told. So you were part of my story, and you must, if you exist like I do, have perceived that you were in control, but are not in control, like me. Your randomness is my perception; and mine is yours.

The universe
I visit a telescope to look at the patterns of the stars. I sit down, look through it, and my eyes focus on a star. The movement of my eyes as they lock onto a star is not from my instruction, my eyes move as part of the complex mathematical unwinding of the universe in its evolution. That I am not in control and yet can focus on a star exemplifies the LOGIC (q.v.) & MATHEMATICS (q.v.) that relate my eyes’ movement, my thought and the star’s position with respect to me over time. I am not in control, and, as shown on the following pages, the process of living is not random.

LOGIC

The above is evidence of determinism. There follows an argument in logic, that uses two axioms, “I think” and “0 does not = 1”, and concludes that without determinism I cannot think. Consequent arguments follow this.

UNIVERSE IS A FRACTAL - Pt. 2: Universe is deterministic

This is the argument expressed in logic statements:

Random process and logic process cannot coexist
Logic process: input determines output
Therefore Logic process output is determinate

Random process: input does not determine output
Therefore Random process output is NOT determinate

Therefore Random process is NOT a logic process

Input either does or does not determine output (Axiom: 0 does not =1):

Therefore Conclusion: Random process XOR[1] logic process

I think

Axiom: “I think therefore I am” (reference: Descartes: “cogito ergo sum’).

The logic of languange

T-H-I-N-K

The mnemonic “T-H-I-N-K” indicates the passage of time during the assembly of T-H-I-N-K in my mind, to give an outcome over time.

T-H-I-N-K - Input Determines Output - logic

The deduction follows from “T-H-I-N-K” that over time subconscious inputs to T-H, with later assemblies of I-N, give rise to K, in the example, and that input determines output for the outcome THINK thought-completion, giving the meaning “think”. (The last letter is not J, for example, instead, T-H-I-N determines K, and that determination is not supplied by my conscious mind because I have not memorised the combinations of characters required to determine the next letter, in this case K, and I certainly do not consciously compute how to complete the word from the preceding characters).

The connection of my mind to reality

Consider the following:

· Immeasurables (e.g. from quantum mechanics, Einstein’s “hidden variables”)

· unperceivables

· activity in other dimensions in my space

· other universes in other dimensions, operating concurrently with this universe’s space

· others

Some of these might change what I perceive, although I cannot measure them. I have represented such quantities, in this context, with the word “ether”. Examples of ether are consciousness, and “life force”. For example, I perceive that someone has died, although I cannot measure the facet that has changed to cause death. Using my definition, this is ether. Ether exists, because you and I cannot measure consciousness. Other examples include the measurement of pain and suffering. Eventually, the quantity for pain, for example, may become measurable, and it can then be removed from the ether.

Ether is deterministic, by deduction, as follows:

Consider the volume indicated within a tiny sphere in the plane or surface of the join between ether and the synapse[2] of one of my brain neurones. The inputs: 1) ether AND 2) electricity AND 3) the physical synapse, cannot together at the same time both determine the output, and yet not determine the output (from the XOR example above). The synaptic encounter delivers the logic “T-H-I-N-K” to my mind, so my input, ether+electricity+synapse determines “T-H-I-N-K” (an assembly of the mnemonic) to my mind: logic. There is also logic execution in my synapse in the real world. Input determines output. Of course, more spheres may actually be needed to determine such advanced logic as the mnemonic “T-H-I-N-K”.

The deduction is that ether+electricity+synapse is logic processing. There are no gradations of logic (logic has a state 1; no logic, 0). A madman still executes language in his mind. So long as there is meaning in the language a man thinks, he has logic in his synapses.

The physical synapse (its chemical composition & movement/flexing), the electricity and the ether are thus deterministic.

If I consider the tiny sphere further, I notice that within it, there is only logic. I increase the radius (r) while considering the expression above “Random process XOR logic process”. Eventually, the radius increases by dr, and just under the surface of the sphere say 2dr deep, comprises possibly part random process and part logic process. Since “Random process XOR logic process”, and there is at least partly a logic process, then random process is a fallacy just under the sphere’s surface. Thus, as the sphere expands further, I eliminate random process from my room, from the world and from the universe. So the “random element” as I have known it for 2 ½ years is excluded, and what’s more, it is a fallacy.

But if the universe if infinite, how can I determine that there is no random element? This question is considered in Pt.3.

Conclusion – Pt 2

UNIVERSE IS DETERMINISTIC

I cannot think otherwise

Some points re later sections:

· LOGIC, will encompass all facets of logic

· MATHEMETICS (universal) is the physical consequence of the execution of LOGIC, comprising, ether and perceivables.

· LOGIC = dTRUTH/dTIME

UNIVERSE IS A FRACTAL - Pt. 3: required deduction re the beginning of universe (notes)

It is illogical that universe started in several places, because nothing would separate the several places. Nothing is not space. Nothing does not exist. Without space, there can be no distance between start points: thus there is one point of origin. This is valid because the universe is logical (see above). Here foreveor?

∞ is indeterminate (for example, ∞ +1)

But Universe is deterministic (over)

Thus Universe is finite

Thus Time in the past is finite

Thus Universe began; time began

Time is continuous (Gaps In Time Give Continuity)

From “Time is continuous” (Above) Þ Logic Continuous (time passes as logic executes)
Logic is present at t=0
At t=0 there logic and nothing is a fallacy.

The reason the universe began is because nothing does not exist.

Conclusion:

Universe is finite and began because nothing is a fallacy

Conjecture:

At t=0, LOGIC, Ether = 0

And within current perceivables:

matter + antimatter =

+ electrostatic charge + -ve electrostatic charge =

energy – light – wave only – zero wavelength =

© 2000-2002, Darren Upton. All rights reserved.

Matt Black - Captured By Aliens - the World holds its breath
http://itunes.apple.com/gb/artist/matthew-black/id288362060

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[1] Either, or, but not both

[2] this not an axiom. The synapse in this context, does not have to be in my brain.