by Chris Chilton
Britain is a nation of car lovers. When it comes to four wheels we care about quality and style. But have you ever considered just how much effort goes into actually building your car, or even where it was built? In the case of the Civic, the CR-V, the Jazz and soon the Type R, the where is right here in the UK, in a factory that’s as complex, efficient and obsessed with minimising its environmental impact as the machines it makes.
From Swindon to San Francisco
This year Honda UK Manufacturing Ltd (HUM) is celebrating its 30th anniversary and also the news that the Swindon plant is now the global hub for Civic and Type R production, meaning it will send British-built Hondas as far afield as the USA.
Located on a 370-acre site, the plant began life as a pre-delivery inspection centre for new Hondas imported from Japan. Three decades – and nearly 3 million cars – later, HUM is a state-of-the-art factory, taking raw metal in at one end, and turning fully showroom-ready cars out at the other.
Efficiency and the environment
The entire production process embodies Honda’s commitment to sustainability. A neighbouring solar farm supplies sufficient power to operate the factory’s lights and switch on machinery, forklift trucks are hydrogen-fuelled and 98 per cent of waste is recycled within the factory or as building materials for local road repairs. HUM literally embedding itself in the community! Honda’s also aware of the factory’s impact on the local community and has staggered start times for shifts to avoid disrupting local roads too much.
Quality as a priority
Commitment to quality is total. One in 1000 engines is pulled off the line and subjected to a punishing schedule of tests. Parts tolerances are monitored to measurements that are 100ths of the thickness of a human hair. Bare doors are mounted fractionally too high so that when they’re weighed down with paint, trim and glass, they’ll sit perfectly. And assembly tools are connected to a computer that logs the tightening of every bolt to ensure that, in the unlikely event that a fault is discovered later, it can be tracked back to its source. Little wonder that an independent study recently named Honda as Britain’s most reliable car brand for the ninth year running.
The Honda philosophy
Together with the joys of innovating and creating, respect for the individual was one of founder Soichiro Honda’s fundamental tenets. It’s why HUM promotes a single status culture. Everyone from the MD to the worker on the line is known as an associate, and wears the same white overalls. And you won’t find cups of coffee on the desks of those with office-based jobs out of respect for their assembly colleagues who can’t simply down tools for a cuppa whenever they feel like it.
Timing is key
Ad hoc tea breaks would play havoc with an operation as precise as the HUM production line. Every single process has been measured to the second, from checking tools at the beginning of a shift, to screwing a bolt, to walking two steps to the left.
There are up to 120 cars on the line at any one time, and assembly is divided into zones such as engine-fitment, with 15-25 associates in each.
When each zone’s parts store is full, it has enough to cover 40 minutes of production, so little trucks constantly buzz along pathways, refilling stores before they run out. Overhead a giant digital scoreboard lets associates know whether they’re on course to reach today’s production target.
Once the cars are finished they’re ready for a track test that takes in every type of road surface, from German autobahn to Belgian cobbles. Then they’re drenched in a monsoon downpour designed to expose any frailties in the door and window seals. If it passes, British rain will be water off a duck’s back.
The wheel turns full circle
The plant produces 560 cars a days with a complex shift system of production and support associates keeping the apparatus functioning at optimum levels at all times. Honda is the largest engine manufacturer in the world and now that Swindon’s status as a global hub for Civic production is assured, tomorrow isn’t only a new day, but a very bright one.
