Robot-filled Tahara Sets Standard For Toyota, Worl

[MikeP]

Robot-filled Tahara sets standard for Toyota, world

Japanese facility puts focus on details

By Christine Tierney / The Detroit News

It is the benchmark of benchmarks: Toyota Motor Co.p.’s untouchable Tahara plant on Japan’s eastern coast.

In 2003, for the second year in a row, J.D. Power and Associates bestowed its highest honor — the platinum award for best quality worldwide — on the Tahara factory that produces Lexus and Toyota vehicles.

Owners of models built at the plant, including the Lexus GS 300 and 430 and LS 430 luxury sedans, reported 63 defects per 100 vehicles — about one-third fewer than owners of premium cars built at the best BMW AG and Mercedes-Benz auto plants in Germany, according to J.D. Power data.

Conceived during Japan’s economic boom, the plant was filled with robots, amid fears of labor shortages and Toyota’s great faith in automation. As one of the automaker’s newer plants, it also allowed Toyota to experiment with new manufacturing ideas and production methods.

Set on a small peninsula on the Mikawa Bay, the factory was designed to be “worker friendly” to attract a new generation of workers who had viewed factory work as dirty, arduous and dangerous.

“It’s one of the most beautiful plants, and very neat and tidy,” said Credit Suisse First Boston analyst Koji Endo in Tokyo. The setting is lovely, too, with fishing on the quays outside.

Built in 1979, “Tahara was actually considered a mistake because it was much too automated,” said auto analyst Maryann Keller of Maryann Keller and Associates in Greenwich, Conn. In terms of costs, “it was not a competitive factory when they built it.”

The sprawling plant is air-conditioned. Computer-controlled robots do the heavy lifting and dirty work. More than 95 percent of the stamping, welding and painting operations are automated, while plant workers focus on the trim and final assembly — the details a customer notices.

Today, Tahara produces 460,000 vehicles a year in its two body shops and three assembly plants. In addition to Lexus exports, the plant complex assembles Toyota’s domestic luxury car, the Crown, the RAV4 sport-utility vehicle and three other models.

Rival luxury automakers may murmur that Lexus cars are merely “souped-up Toyotas” because the two brands share a wide array of parts. But suppliers to Toyota know better.

Tahara sets and demands the highest standards.

Toyota, already a stickler for quality, will not accept components if defects exceed 50 per million parts shipped. In contrast, for Lexus vehicles, Tahara managers insist on fewer than 10 defects per million parts.

From the outset, former plant manager Kousuke Shiramizu, now executive vice president in charge of product and product engineering, established that the margin for error for Lexus vehicles would be half what it was at Toyota.

On average at Toyota, air leaks from car exhaust systems are held to 100 liters per minute, to reduce noise. On Lexus models produced at the Tahara plant, the ceiling is a stingy 8.6 liters of air per minute.

The plant’s strict quality checks include a final stretch of inspections for cars coming off the line under the unforgiving glare of very bright lights.

Toyota also tinkered with changes in the assembly line organization at Tahara, establishing several sub-assembly lines so temporary stoppages would not halt all production.

“Tahara’s the next plateau,” said consultant Dennis Pawley, former manufacturing chief at Chrysler. “Rather than having one continuous line, they’re going against the old adage and breaking up the line.”

Living up to Tahara’s standards keeps everyone at Toyota plants around the world on their toes.

You can reach Christine Tierney at (313) 222-1463 or ctierney@detnews.com.

[vcv10guy]

Congratulations Tahara Plant on your award. Keep up the good work!

[VBdenny]

Is that where all Lexus cars are made?

[GSsoldier]

does anyone know if u can visit that place?? i would love to go there to say hi to new lexuses being built

[vcv10guy]

VBdenny

The LS, GS, and GX are made at the Tahara plant. The ES are made at Tsutsumi, Kyushu. The IS is made at Kanji (Iwate Plant) and the SC is at Kanji (Kanto Jidosha). LX is made at Araco and finally the RX is made at Kyushu, and at the new plant they opened at Cambridge, Ontario. I got that infrormation from Lexus.com under there corporate information.

GSsoldier

To my knowledge I think you can have a tour at that plant. I believe SK was going to have a tour there or at a Lexus plant (can't remember). I for one would love to go a Toyota/Lexus manufacturing plant. There is actually a factory in Fremont, CA (NUMMI) that makes the Corolla and Tacoma, and maybe some other cars too.