Anne Stevens, Vice President
Ford North America Vehicle Operations

DEARBORN, Mich., Dec. 3, 2002 -- When the new Dearborn Truck Plant (DTP) begins operations in 2004, it will be more than the home of the new 2004 Ford F-150. It will signal an expansion of the company’s manufacturing vision and the first major step toward making the legendary Ford Rouge Center an industrial icon of the 21st century.

The plant will be the flagship of Ford’s next-generation lean and flexible manufacturing facilities.

• It will be capable of producing up to nine different models from three vehicle platforms, making it Ford’s most flexible North American assembly plant.
• The number of workstations in the assembly process will be reduced by nearly 40 percent.
• Storage space for components and vehicles will be reduced by 50 percent.
• DTP will have no more than two hours of line-side parts and inventory, and 10 hours of off-line component inventory space. Normal inventory supply for most assembly plants is one to two days or more.
• Construction of the new plant is scheduled to be completed in 2003, with 2004 Ford F-150 production beginning in 2004. It’s the first new assembly plant Ford has built in North America since 1986.

Flexibility Flagship

Dearborn Truck Plant is a key example of Ford’s commitment to establish a next-generation flexible manufacturing system in its North American assembly operations. By mid-decade, about half of Ford’s body shops, trim and final assembly operations will be flexible. That number will rise to 75 percent by the end of the decade. The system is expected to save the company $1.5 billion to $2 billion in the coming decade.

DTP’s flexible features include the ability to:

• Quickly change the plant’s production according to customer demand.
• Convert to new products with minimal investment and changeover loss.
• Easily retool, and reprogram robots and computers for rapid changeover on the plant floor.

“With increasing market segmentation, Ford’s new flexible assembly system means the company can react more quickly to meet shifting customer demand,” said Al Ver, vice president, Ford Advanced and Manufacturing Engineering. “The company will be able to produce a wider variety of vehicles, change the mix of products and options, and change volumes – faster and with minimal costs.”

Lean Manufacturing

The Dearborn Truck Plant will have world-class lean manufacturing using Synchronous Material Flow (SMF) to support team-based production processes. These processes are designed to provide outstanding quality and minimize waste in a safe work environment that emphasizes employee empowerment. Vehicles will be manufactured at the lowest cost in the shortest time possible.

“Quality is built in at each workstation based on these standardized work processes and a clear understanding of the customer’s expectation,” said Jay Richardson, Rouge project manager, Ford Vehicle Operations.

Although many plants use SMF to synchronize vehicle and supplier production at the same rate of customer demand, the Dearborn Truck Plant will use a combination of material delivery systems. These include In-line Vehicle Sequencing and an Automatic Sequence and Retrieval system that are both designed to sequence units into a predictable schedule. This allows Ford suppliers to more precisely plan deliveries and allows the plant to optimize efficiency. As part of a new fast-paced delivery system, truck docks allow material unloading within a 15-minute window.