A ready-to-drive car coming off the production line every 57 seconds? An almost unrealizable notion that you only believe once you have seen the assembly and production lines of the Škoda plant in Mladá Boleslav.
For the students of the Joining and Assembly Technology module and other interested fellow students, this tour became a reality. After two highly informative guest lectures by the company's management, which further increased interest in a tour of the site, the long-awaited factory tour was carried out with the help of Prof. Dr.-Ing.
Ignoring the academic quarter, we set off with a full bus in the direction of Mladá Boleslav. After a good hour's drive, we arrived at Gate 8 of the factory premises and were overwhelmed by the size of the site. With almost 20,000 employees, the plant is the main employer in the region and dominates the entire image of the town.
After a short introduction, "armed" with safety goggles and reflective vests, we went into the M15 press shop. The large presses and heavy coils were very impressive.
Every second, body parts are punched from the unrolled sheet steel. With the help of changeover tools, a quick changeover for the various car types can be realized. Pressed parts for the FABIA, OCTAVIA and RAPID models as well as for the new SCALA are currently produced in this part of the site. This highly automated production of pressed parts was a new experience for all of us. At 10:30 a.m. we went to the M14 body shop. Things got even more interesting here!
In this department, the stamped and pressed body parts are assembled into a body shell or chassis. The enormous number of robots, mostly from the KUKA brand, and the different types of resistance welding as well as the incredibly fast cycle time of the parts passing through is an enriching experience to watch.
The body construction department was also an informative addition to the robot technology module for the production technicians, as they were able to experience a wide range of different robot translations and handling. After a short transfer within the factory premises by bus (10 minutes!), which once again emphasized the size of the site, we were taken on a guided tour of the M1 assembly line.
Here we were able to see the assembly line assembly of the above-mentioned car models. The continuous assembly line, on which the vehicle to be built and the employees stand, is an almost unreal experience. The cycle time here is so fast that a car passed through the entire assembly line in the short time it took our tour guide to speak. A special feature of the line in Mladá Boleslav is that different equipment and models are assembled within the assembly line. An OCTAVIA follows a RAPID and then comes a FABIA, for example. Another technical highlight of the M1 assembly line was the so-called "marriage", the combination of engine and body, which we will remember for a long time.
After the trip to the assembly line, we were taken to the foundry and forge. This department produces tens of millions of forged and cast parts. The heavy hydraulic forging hammers and machines are operated automatically and, to our astonishment, a kind of flow production was evident even in this department. However, we did not expect this type of production in this clean factory. Loud, dirty and with a room temperature reminiscent of summer at the beach, production is carried out for other company sites. Despite the aforementioned adversities, this department was very interesting and we were able to get an idea of what a tough working day the colleagues there have.
The last stop in the afternoon was component production. Countless automatic turning, milling and grinding machines as well as flexible production systems for fully automatic machining are used in this department to produce engine blocks, crankshafts and other high-precision parts for assembly, for example.
We were able to follow some of the work steps on the machines and were impressed by the hardening shop. One of the methods used there is vacuum hardening with helium, which is far less harmful to the environment than quenching in oil or other media.
The eventful but exhausting tour of the plant ended at around 2:30 pm. We had walked several kilometers on foot. The realization that we were only able to see a fraction of this highly complex site gives us an idea of the dimensions of Škoda's central location.
The journey home was interrupted for a refreshing and much-needed break at the Pivovar Svijany a.s. brewery. However, the aching feet were quickly forgotten over a good lunch and a cold house beer. The subsequent tour of the brewery, organized by Dipl.-Ing. (FH) Kammler, showed us another important economic sector in the Czech Republic. The production of various types of beer is just as fully automated here as the construction of cars at Škoda. In 2017, 637,500 hectoliters of beer were brewed and marketed. Enough to recommend this tour as a complete package to other fellow students!
With this in mind, we would like to thank Prof. Dr.-Ing. Kretschmar and Dipl.-Ing. (FH) Kammler for this wonderful and, above all, informative excursion. We hope that many more students will take the opportunity to have a guided tour in this style. The practical relevance of the courses is strengthened and as a student at the Zittau/Görlitz University of Applied Sciences you can only benefit from such offers!
Text: Ferhat Macar and Martin Friedrich, K-MMd 15
This excursion is part of the cooperation between the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering at our university and Škoda AUTO a.s. Mladá Boleslav, Department of Digitalization and Industry 4.0.
In the compulsory elective module Joining and Assembly Technology, lectures were given by leading Škoda engineers on the topics of car body construction planning, assembly planning and component production at our university.
We would like to thank the company and all those involved for the content-rich lectures and the very detailed factory tour.
Chair of Production Engineering
