Kiran Chetry: Here at Ford's Rouge Electric Vehicle Center
there's a charge in the air.
The new F-150 Lightning pickups are rolling off the line
and headed to homes where buyers
of the country's best selling truck are plugging in
to the electrified future of driving.
I'm Kiran Chetry, your host, as we meet
the highly specialized workers
who have assembled a new vision
for automotive manufacturing.
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Welcome to the United States of Automation, EV edition.
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It doesn't get more American than Ford.
And the industry it represents is facing possibly
its biggest disruption since Henry Ford rolled out
the Model T in 1908.
Automakers are on pace to invest half a trillion dollars
over the next five years to fill
garages and driveways with EVs.
That means vehicle factories are in for major upgrades
like the ones Ford has undertaken here
at what plant workers call the REVC.
Tell us a little bit about the significance
of this River Rouge Complex for Ford.
Liza Currie:It's so phenomenal having this new building,
this new product, built on the historic site.
We no longer have the tradition
or assembly line on the conveyance system.
Each and every unit is built
on its own individual AGV, or automatic guided vehicle.
And so, you just have a lot of flexibility
from a ergo standpoint, for the standpoint
that people to make sure they can build it correctly.
Kiran: How does the automation make a difference
for the customer that's gonna be buying the F-150 Lightning?
Chris Skaggs: The automation doesn't get tired.
It'll do the same thing all day, every day, repeatedly.
So, they're getting a truck with tighter tolerances.
They're getting everything checked more carefully
than they would've in the past.
Kiran: How would the workers
on the floor embrace the new technologies
and the automation?
Chris: I think they love it.
It makes their job easier.
In terms of big automation,
people aren't doing really heavy lifting
or really challenging tasks ergonomically anymore.
Liza:Everything from the digital zone boards,
the digital tablets, from the workstation,
we're paperless and everything is more automated
to where there's constant communication,
whether it's with MP&L organization,
with the maintenance team,
or even with their supervisor or process coach.
Kiran: With all of these moving parts,
factories of the future don't have seconds to spare.
To help build the F-150 Lightning,
Ford and AT&T are outfitting the Rouge plant
with highly secure, next-generation,
5G cellular connectivity.
Clara Hustad: 5G is incredibly important for the future of manufacturing
because as things start to happen a lot quicker
you want to make sure you have the right technology
that can keep up with your robots.
But also it helps revitalize facilities
where you have existing older technology.
Bringing in 5G can help offload some
of your newer components
to the factory without making
those incredibly difficult changes.
For your Greenfield facilities,
that gives you an opportunity to set
up the most advanced technology and connectivity
and nothing that you're doing
in the factory can happen without connectivity.
The privacy aspect of a private 5G network is beautiful
because any of the data that you generate
within the four walls of your facility will stay there.
Additionally, any of the data that you collect
from your robots on site hits your server
that's also on site, allowing you to make decisions
with that data in near real time.
Chris: This is our flex inspect system.
We have a robot vision system
on it that checks all those connections.
And if it's anything that it doesn't like.
says, hey, double check this, they'll do that.
And what's really neat about it is we have a lot
of checking at the end of the line,
but then it's a lot harder to fix after it's fully built.
So, we're pushing that technology upstream
into the process at various points.
This blue and gray robot is a collaborative robot.
It actually has a sensitive skin.
If I were to walk up
to it and touch it while it's running, it would stop.
It knows I'm there and it won't hurt me.
Clara: The way I think about a cobot
versus a an actual robot is these are robots
there to help humans.
You wanna make sure that you're keeping your workforce safe
and repetitive jobs also cause the most injuries.
Chris: But, it will go into the bed of the truck,
it will push down on the box bolts
with a certain percentage of the payload on the truck.
Then the truck knows that this much displacement
in my suspension is equal to this much weight
so it calibrates it for that specific truck.
Clara: As an employer, if you can move people
from those redundant jobs into more thought-provoking jobs
that's advantageous for you as a business.
And then lastly, it really helps
with the small movements that you need to make
and making sure
that you're supervising those activities properly
and using the humans that you have
in your facility in the best way possible.
Kiran: How is automation going to become part
of Ford's long-term strategy?
Chris: I mean, we're always looking
for opportunities to improve safety, quality, or efficiency.
And one opportunity
for us is to leverage the product's technology,
and use the technology of the vehicle and synthesize it
with the technology in the plant and work in harmony.
Kiran: And as electric vehicles accelerate
toward the American mainstream,
this collaboration between highly skilled people
and their automated tools
is proving more powerful than ever.
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