Automotive Design & Production

Talk: Marginal

Better Green Than (in the) Red

The author is fairly confident that the Nobel Peace Prize recipient and Academy Award-winning former Vice Pres Al Gore is now making a considerable amount of money as he travels around promoting the idea that the planet is being trashed by the human inhabitants and excoriating waste in all forms, with the exception, perhaps, of excessive wealth. Gore's plan goes beyond just cars and has implications for a wide array of industries in the US but that is a good thing for the US auto industry, be...

Talk: Insight

A Problem-Solving Tool for Problematic Times

The reflection process is a technique that is used for problem-solving, but it is much more. It is a way of interacting as a group around a common issue, and it is a testament to the value of drawing on the company's human assets. There are a series of steps that must be executed in order and thoroughly. A cross-functional team is brought together to work through the following processes: 1. Answer the question "What are we trying to do?" 2. Complete a description of the problem situation. 3. ...

Notable

Ocean-Front Property in Georgetown, Kentucky

Steve St. Angelo, president, Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky and SVP, Toyota Motor Engineering a Manufacturing North America, recalls working at New United Motor Manufacturing (NUMMI) back in 1995. Actually, he was there not to be working at NUMMI per se, but, as a GM executive advisor, to be there learning the Toyota Production System. St. Angelo says that he was rather insistent that he do something rather than just observe. He was the group leader in an area where there was a particula...

Gm's Light Truck Strategy: Nip and Tuck

As gasoline prices price skyrocketed in late 2007 and early 2008, GM's truck engineering team was concerned about what would happen to their products, which had been providing a consistent flow of revenue to the automaker's bottom line. Their worry was well-placed as the reality was worse than their expectations -- GM's light truck volumes fell 23% through the first seven months of 2008, and the company canceled the development of the next-generation full-size truck platform. Within six month...

Gm Improves Powertrain Throughput

General Motors (GM) continues to pursue its "Road to Lab to Math" strategy that pushes more development work into the analysis realm in order to reduce the time and cost necessary to produce new powertrains. Dan Hancock, VP, GM Powertrain Global Engineering, believes GM Powertrain's new Engineering Development Center in Pontiac, MI, will improve calibration efficiency by as much as 50% as it rolls out 68 new calibration procedures that will reduce the number of on-road tests necessary to adju...

'Green' Steel

WorldAutoSteel is undertaking its fifth vehicular automotive research project, the "Future Steel Vehicle," which is predicated on demonstrating the benefits of lightweight steel bodies combined with alternative powertrains. One of the reasons behind the work is to show that when it comes to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions over the lifecycle of a vehicle, steel is beneficial. Jody Shaw, manager, Automotive Marketing, United States Steel Corp, points out that one of the considerations that needs...

Nissan Redesigns the Fuel Cell

'09 Volkswagen Golf Revealed

Talk: Insider

Detroit's Katrina

During a recent presentation on the state of the US automotive and supplier industries, Daniel Cheng, VP of consulting firm A.T. Kearney, compared the beating the industry is taking to that of a hurricane. It's highly unlikely automakers will open their checkbooks and the drying up of credit markets is likely to leave bankers sitting on the sidelines, holding on to whatever cash they have for investments with better returns. A solution can be found through out-of-the-box thinking when it come...

Talk: Dudder

Skeptics Welcome

The Pepsi Challenge was a blind taste test started in 1975 that had people sample unmarked glasses of cola, and pick their preferred drink based solely on taste. A similar blind "tasting" at a recent domestic OEM's launch event is a reminder of Pepsi's marketing effort, and how it turned the tide of perception for many people and increased market share. The problem faced by the domestics, however, is a daunting one: How to change the perception of their companies and products after years of b...

Talk: Profiles

Chris Theodore: Keeping Performance Alive

One of the last times that the author saw Chris Theodore -- the newly named CEO of American Specialty Cars and Saleen Inc was in 2003, before Theodore retired from Ford. Though insiders say Theodore's 2004 departure from Ford was driven by internal political intrigue, it's a subject which he sidesteps easily. American Specialty Cars was under the leadership of Theodore's former Chrysler colleague Paul Wilbur, and it didn't take long before Theodore joined his team in late 2005. Describing car...

Talk: Euro Auto

Formula One: Beyond the Engine Freeze

Over the last few months Max Mosley, president of the Federation Internationale de l'Automobile, the regulatory body that controls Formula One and most other international motor sport championships, has made the headlines around the world, not for anything he has done in his official capacity, but for his behavior behind closed private doors. His most talked-about act was to impose an engine "freeze" a couple of years ago in Formula One, which meant that the 2.4-liter, naturally aspirated V8s...

Talk: Competitive Challenges

It's What's Up Front That Counts

It's hard to believe that Americans are already in the third quarter of 2008. While many of them wish they could backpedal to avoid the struggles of this long year in the auto industry, they are also looking forward to 2009 planning and determining what can be done differently. Take, for example, Honda and Toyota. Both operate with an extreme amount of flexibility in their manufacturing processes, allowing the daily system to seamlessly convert from one vehicle or platform to another. By desi...

Feature

The Future of Steering

Delphi Steering is a company with a rich heritage in steering, having invented hydraulic power steering more than 50 years ago, and having been in steering for another 50 years before that. But here's where the "future" comes in for Delphi Steering: On Feb 21, 2008, the the US Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York approved Delphi Corp's request to sell its global steering and halfshaft business to Platinum Equity. So far as they're concerned, the going tech is electric power ...

Vw Pursues Advanced Electronics

When you think "Volkswagen," you might not think much further than the New Beetle. After all, VW only has about 1.5% of the US market. However, Volkswagen Group's requirements are a whole lot bigger because it is the fourth-largest vehicle manufacturer on the planet, with 9.8% of the total market. According to Jurgen Leohold, executive director, Group Research, the approximately 700 personnel located in Germany, the US, Japan, and China, are working in several areas. Of these areas, one of th...

The Future of Electric Steering Assist

For smaller vehicles, especially those in the A-, B-, and C-class range, the future of power steering belongs to fully electric systems because of their greater efficiency. Larger vehicles, however, won't follow the same path, says Dieter Fehlings, engineering director EPHS Steering Systems, TRW Automotive. Therefore, electrically powered hydraulic systems must be substituted. Electro-hydraulic assist systems don't use as much power as the electric motor isn't used to directly drive the steer...

Avl's Holistic Approach to Powertrain Testing

As OEMs accelerate their migration to fuel-efficient, smaller-displacement engines, the pressure on powertrain engineers is reaching a fevered pitch. Powertrain testing and calibration systems provider AVL is laying the foundation to develop hardware and software solutions that will help engineers use more accurate virtual simulation tools and data management systems to meet their top priorities: reduced time-to-market, better quality, and improved collaboration. Powertrain complexity and inc...

Acoustic Quality Control

A spin-off of Wayne State University's School of Engineering, SenSound's SenQC diagnostic software has the capability of finding stuck valves in engines or determining if a drill is becoming dull. It's understandable given that the presence of loud background noises and the small deviation between "good" and "bad" products reduces the confidence level in any acoustic measurements. But SenSound's software can effectively eliminate background noise, making it possible to "sanitize" readings and...

Dodge Challenger: Mopar's Modern Muscle Car

Work on the Challenger began at Chrysler's recently closed Pacifica Design facility in California in 2004, just as Ford was introducing the current generation Mustang. Compared to Ford's Mustang, the Challenger is a big car, and -- except for the 4.0-in shorter wheelbase and 1.4-in lower height -- it is even bigger than the 300. Also, at 3,720 lb, the Challenger is approximately 600 lb heavier than the Mustang. The Challenger SE is powered by a 3.5-liter, single overhead cam, 24-valve V6 mate...

Software As a Service for Erp

Inteva Products LLC started with nothing when it spun off from Delphi Interiors and Closures last March. It does not have an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. Inteva wanted an ERP system that better fit the new company's business model and size. Inteva decided on Plexus Online from Plexus Systems Inc. This is an on-demand software system, technically known as "software as a service." Over 350 software modules in the Plexus system are accessible via the Internet from anywhere in the w...

Kia's Borrego: Right Vehicle, Wrong Time?

Four years ago, when gasoline was $2 per gallon, a vehicle like the Borrego made a lot of sense. All that began to change, however, as gas prices started a relentless charge toward record highs, though this has lessened a bit in recent months. Forecasts are showing a strengthening in the mid-size SUV segment in 2009-2010 as full-size SUV buyers that still want the space, utility, and capability of their big trucks seek out opportunities in the mid-size segment, says Tom Loveless, VP Sales at ...

Multi-Cad Environments

Solids modelers based on boundary representation were all about topology. While feature-based parametric modeling isn't about to go away anytime soon, it does have limitations. Now embedded in the latest versions of both NX and Solid Edge, synchronous technology (ST) from Siemens PLM tries to overcome these problems. Introduced in April, 2008, ST combines the best of constraint-driven modeling with the best from direct modeling. It removes the linear dependency of features found in parametric...

Maxima: Sports Car As Daily Driver

Despite things like the availability of bucket seats in both rows in the six-generation Maxima, with the latest 2009 Maxima Nissan is announcing the return of the 4-Door Sports Car. Mark Perry, director of Cross Carline Product Strategy at Nissan North America, points out that the three-mode Xtronic continuously variable transmission has been calibrated with more than 700 shift logic algorithms that it offers a manual mode, that there are optional paddle shifters, and that Nissan engineers de...

Mazda6: Lessons Learned

When Mazda introduced the Mazda6 in 2003, it was the result of the brand's plan to build a global C/D segment sedan that could attract the attention of buyers in Europe, Asia and North America with little product differentiation. There were areas where the current Mazda6 did not meet the expectations of the US market -- quality, power and size, says Tim Barnes, director of product safety and planning for Mazda North America, who points out that most of the quality problems centered around att...

Close Up

Kuka Kr 1000 Titan

To describe the new robot from KUKA Robotics Corp, the KR 1000 Titan, as "big" is to essentially understate the case. This robot can handle a payload of 1,000 kg. That's said to be the highest capacity of a six-axis machine with an open kinematic chain. One application area that the robot can be fitted to handle foundry work. Or it can be used in the more benign conditions of an assembly plant. Given its payload capacity, it is capable of handling an entire body-in-white by itself, which coul...