.

.March 24, 2004
.
This Week:

• The New BMW 1 Series

• High Performance SV-R A Hit At Geneva

• Sebring Convertible Reigns Supreme in U.S. Convertible Market

• Mazda Builds MX-5 Number 700,000

• Toyota Hosts Auction on eBay for the Fight Against Women's Cancers and Supports the 2004 Revlon Run/Walk For Women in Los Angeles

• DaimlerChrysler Removes Topic of Variable Supervisory Board Remuneration from the Agenda of the 2004 Annual Meeting

• Where The Rubber Meets The Runway: GM And IADT Fuel Student Fashion Show With Clothing Designs Inspired By Today's Hottest Vehicles

• Nissan Announces Management and Organizational Changes

• One year after the launch: The Touran is most frequently bought in Germany

• Louisville Plant Gets Multi-Million Dollar Expansion

© 1998 - 2004 Copyright & 
Disclaimer
Automotive Intelligence,
www.autointell.com
All Rights Reserved .
For questions please contact
editor@autointell.com  

.
Louisville Plant Gets Multi-Million Dollar Expansion
 

Ford Motor Company's investment tops $73 million and renews its commitment to Louisville production. Kentucky Truck Plant's new stamping press is scheduled to begin operating in 2006. The expanded parts production illustrates Ford's continued focus on reducing costs while improving quality, as it invests for future growth. Louisville, Ky. - Ford Motor Company's Kentucky Truck Plant (KTP) is expanding here - with a $73 million dollar investment to increase parts production for Ford trucks. Groundwork has begun on construction of a new facility to house a new stamping press line. It is scheduled for completion during the first half of 2006.

The stamping facility will add 95,000 square feet to the current "footprint" of what already is considered to be North America's largest truck plant. The Kentucky Truck Plant currently is more than six million square feet and sits on a 416-acre site.

When the stamping facility opens in 2006, it will operate with a unique, flexible operating pattern -- allowing KTP employees to produce parts around the clock, 24 hours-per-day, seven-days-per-week.

"This arrangement speaks to the kind of innovative flexibility that exists at KTP -- between the union and management -- that has allowed us to secure this investment," said Kentucky Truck Plant Manager John Crew.

Additional stamping production will allow Ford to "in-source" more parts that make up Ford F-250 and F-350, the Super Duty pickup trucks built by KTP employees. An additional 15 parts for KTP products will be stamped in the new facility. The new parts will include front fenders, sides for pickup box beds, roof panels, hoods, tailgates and floor pans. The new stamping facility will be joined to an existing KTP stamping facility built in 1998.

Today, about 70 percent of KTP's stamping production is devoted to Ford Explorer and Ford Excursion. Ford Excursions are built at KTP. Ford Explorers are built at Louisville and St. Louis assembly plants. The current facility also stamps some body sides, body side inners and roofs for Lincoln Aviators built in St. Louis and some door and roof parts for KTP-built Super Duty trucks. In addition, it stamps some door parts for Ford Escapes built at the company's Kansas City and Ohio Assembly plants.

When the new stamping press begins operating, it is expected to turn out approximately 100,000 parts per week - more than doubling the number of parts now produced by KTP. The new state-of-the-art stamping press will result in higher quality parts at a lower cost - a fundamental part of Ford's strategy to deliver outstanding products, lower costs and aggressively invest for future growth in its products, processes and facilities.

Ford Motor Company personnel who already are employed by the company will fill the new jobs resulting from the new stamping investment.

The $73 million investment for expanded stamping capacity is in addition to substantial investments Ford Motor Company has made in KTP over recent years. In the last two years, Ford has invested in excess of $100 million to upgrade operations and boost production of F-Series Super Duty trucks.

For example, the company invested $50 million in KTP last year. That investment included a $25.2 million paint shop expansion, a $12 million overhaul of the body shop and an $8 million renovation of the plant's chassis line. Ford also invested more than $60 million in new-model production and modernization efforts at KTP - including production costs associated with the all-new Harley Davidson Super Duty, the King Ranch Super Duty and the all-new 6.0L diesel engine.

KTP employs approximately 5,900 men and women. They built a total of 402,768 trucks in 2003 - including 377,149 F-Series Super Duty trucks and 25,619 Ford Excursions, a production increase of 6.8 percent. The plant paid $26.4 million in state and local taxes last year.

Most KTP employees are members of UAW Local 862. They earned more than $460 million in wages last year and donated a significant amount of it back to the community. For instance, KTP employee donations to the United Way totaled $700,000 last year. Plant employees also gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to other local community organizations.

(March 24, 2004)