Ford's being built factory [Archive]

Keith Seymore

03-09-2021, 02:58 PM

Occasionally you will hear discussion about the "body gate" (or body side fixture), particularly in reference to tracking numbers stamped into the cowl tag.

You can see it in this video, pretty much first thing (11 seconds in, or so). That's what we are talking about when we say "body gate".

Other observations:

Body shop process is pretty typical of the day, with individual gates and fixtures being hung and clamped in position on the body carrier as it goes by. The exception would be the Flint Assembly pickup cab shop, which was pretty advanced in that it was all automated. Individual panels were placed in at the appropriate spots and a completed pickup cab popped out the other end. (Downside: it broke down a lot. Upside: it ran fast enough that it could fill the banks and accumulators, so the paint shop and final line could keep running while the body shop was down).

Use of lead to fill body seams is pretty cool, and becoming a lost art. We only had one spot that was filled, with braze, at it was at the top of the A Pillar where met the roof outer panel.

The kid painting was probably sweeping the floor the day before.

Instrument panel install was pretty forward thinking. We still had dash sheetmetal structure welded into the pickup cab, which necessitated a lot of awkward work laying on your back to build up the dash. We didn't have instrument panels built up off line on a separate carrier and conveyed to the vehicle as completed units until several design generations later.

You can see the general assembly sequence number ("232") for that car written on the windshield glass as it is flipped around. That's the number everyone is referencing to make sure they are still on the right vehicle. A little bit of technology, too, in terms of the suction cups and robotic flipper.

You can see the build sheets hanging on the frame, steering column, engine carriers on the motor line - and - the guy checking off his build manifest. Believe it or not it is really hard to know if you are on the right vehicle, especially if you are in "the zone" or if there has been a lot of starting/stopping or with really slow line rates. Checking things off helps keep you in the right order and gives a tangible record that the work has been performed, fasteners tightened, inspected, etc.

Front end sheetmetal install: "buck build" vs "piecemeal": Tended to vary based on whatever is was en vogue at the time. When I started in Flint, Line 1 pickups were built piecemeal (radiator support set loosely on the chassis, then LH fender, then RH fender, then hood) but Line 2 Blazer/Suburban was "buck build" as shown here. Same product, under the same roof; different process.

Lift tools: may seem like back savers but can be pretty clunky. There were a lot of lift assists not used because the operator could do the work much faster without it, or if he wanted to work way ahead on the line and his assist tool limited his ability to move upstream.

Inspection ticket stuck in the gas door: I've talked recently about how the placement of the inspection ticket could mean different things.

Be careful walking around behind the plant! Those drivers are flying around to get where their going. Pontiac employees have been known to spin a tire or two while shuttling vehicles where they needed to go in the back yard. Also - a "driver" was an actual job classification for during the regular 8 hour production shift. But - after the line when down for the day - any hourly employee could volunteer for overtime to shuttle vehicles around out back in order to work the repair backlog down, and salaried production supervisors were expected to "volunteer" to supervise those overtime hours, without pay, of course.

K