5 ms·

A factory capable of producing over 1000 cars per day is truly staggering. When I was living in the Midwest, the traffic lights were synced to the local GM pla

A factory capable of producing over 1000 cars per day is truly staggering. When I was living in the Midwest, the traffic lights were synced to the local GM plant's shift schedule because the volume of employees driving in made it look like traffic to a theme park. Does Tesla's factory do something similar?

tfm 10y ago
I was disappointed that there is no live traffic view available around the Gigafactory [0], but filled with joy to see that its access road is named Electric Avenue. Previous reports seem to indicate that the workers may be at the factory for 20 hours a day, so perhaps they're all sleeping next to Elon in burlap sacks to cut down on congestion? [0] https://www.google.com/maps/@39.5375576,-119.4397724,14.46z/data=!5m1!1e1 https://www.google.com/maps/@39.5375576,-119.4397724,14.46z/...
- mrec 10y ago
  You might also enjoy Letsby Avenue in Sheffield, home of the South Yorkshire Police Operations Complex. https://www.google.com/maps/place/Letsby+Ave,+Sheffield,+South+Yorkshire+S9,+UK/@53.395609,-1.400877,17z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x487977c3772a9353:0xa4b1e940b7ae6f81!8m2!3d53.395609!4d-1.3986883 https://www.google.com/maps/place/Letsby+Ave,+Sheffield,+Sou...
  - aetherson 10y ago
    I didn't get it. That's apparently a very British joke. Explanation for anyone similarly baffled: http://forum.wordreference.com/threads/999-letsby-avenue.1476317/ http://forum.wordreference.com/threads/999-letsby-avenue.147...
mikeyouse 10y ago
I toured the GM Delta Factory a few years ago in Lansing, MI and at the time they were running three shifts at over 60 cars/hour or roughly 1500 cars/day. At the time it was built, it was the most modern and automated factory in the world. The thing that impressed me most was that the shell would be assembled for painting, then the doors would go off on their merry way and rejoin the same car hours later right before the final checks so that the paint would exactly match. Lateish edit I forgot to add, all of those crazy robots in the Tesla videos that assemble the vehicles without human intervention? Other manufacturers have relied on those for at least a decade.. It was generally considered proprietary which is why it seemed so novel when Tesla released their promo videos.
Animats 10y ago
It's not unusual. Here's the Mercedes A-class assembly line.[1] Cycle time is about 40 seconds. That's 720 cars in an 8 hour shift. It's not unusual to run two shifts of production, and do maintenance on the third. In some highly automated plants, maintenance is in the daytime, and production is at night, with few people around. That's more for small parts than entire cars. Production line design and tuning is all about cycle time. The line runs at the speed of the slowest station. Any operation that takes too long has to be broken up into successive operations, even if one station could do it. You can fan out the line to multiple stations if you absolutely have to have a long cycle, but that adds cost, takes up floor space, and is really tough to retrofit. It's not unusual, though, to redesign the slowest station if that will speed up the whole line. Take a look at that Mercedes assembly line. Note all the custom fixtures required, many with sensor and actuators attached. All those have to be designed, built, tested, and run through enough cycles that they behave reliably. One failure stops the whole line. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VreG1iC65Lc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VreG1iC65Lc

tfm 10y ago

I was disappointed that there is no live traffic view available around the Gigafactory [0], but filled with joy to see that its access road is named Electric Avenue. Previous reports seem to indicate that the workers may be at the factory for 20 hours a day, so perhaps they're all sleeping next to Elon in burlap sacks to cut down on congestion? [0] https://www.google.com/maps/@39.5375576,-119.4397724,14.46z/data=!5m1!1e1 https://www.google.com/maps/@39.5375576,-119.4397724,14.46z/...

mrec 10y ago
You might also enjoy Letsby Avenue in Sheffield, home of the South Yorkshire Police Operations Complex. https://www.google.com/maps/place/Letsby+Ave,+Sheffield,+South+Yorkshire+S9,+UK/@53.395609,-1.400877,17z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x487977c3772a9353:0xa4b1e940b7ae6f81!8m2!3d53.395609!4d-1.3986883 https://www.google.com/maps/place/Letsby+Ave,+Sheffield,+Sou...
- aetherson 10y ago
  I didn't get it. That's apparently a very British joke. Explanation for anyone similarly baffled: http://forum.wordreference.com/threads/999-letsby-avenue.1476317/ http://forum.wordreference.com/threads/999-letsby-avenue.147...

mikeyouse 10y ago

I toured the GM Delta Factory a few years ago in Lansing, MI and at the time they were running three shifts at over 60 cars/hour or roughly 1500 cars/day. At the time it was built, it was the most modern and automated factory in the world. The thing that impressed me most was that the shell would be assembled for painting, then the doors would go off on their merry way and rejoin the same car hours later right before the final checks so that the paint would exactly match. Lateish edit I forgot to add, all of those crazy robots in the Tesla videos that assemble the vehicles without human intervention? Other manufacturers have relied on those for at least a decade.. It was generally considered proprietary which is why it seemed so novel when Tesla released their promo videos.

Animats 10y ago

It's not unusual. Here's the Mercedes A-class assembly line.[1] Cycle time is about 40 seconds. That's 720 cars in an 8 hour shift. It's not unusual to run two shifts of production, and do maintenance on the third. In some highly automated plants, maintenance is in the daytime, and production is at night, with few people around. That's more for small parts than entire cars. Production line design and tuning is all about cycle time. The line runs at the speed of the slowest station. Any operation that takes too long has to be broken up into successive operations, even if one station could do it. You can fan out the line to multiple stations if you absolutely have to have a long cycle, but that adds cost, takes up floor space, and is really tough to retrofit. It's not unusual, though, to redesign the slowest station if that will speed up the whole line. Take a look at that Mercedes assembly line. Note all the custom fixtures required, many with sensor and actuators attached. All those have to be designed, built, tested, and run through enough cycles that they behave reliably. One failure stops the whole line. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VreG1iC65Lc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VreG1iC65Lc