MICK3

I received this in an e-mail, thought some on the forum would enjoy it.
Nice cars back then.

Building the 1936 Chevy. Chevrolet's first "all steel" car.
http://www.dump.com/2011/07/15/fasci...ly-line-video/

Mike Terry

Very cool. Look at the guys working in between the moving machines. OSHA would not go for that crap these days.

AZDoug

A mechanical ballet.

Doug

66jack

Human Robots....

GreaseMonkey

Actually at the time laborers. Both of my parents did that (not automotive) all of their lives. And definitely not for the wages the UAW receive(d)s

Great video though. I love this kind of stuff.
This kind of stuff needs to be shown to today's youth. It wasn't always based on a computer baby..

Jalopy31

Very cool - thanks for posting the link.

StingU2

Amazing, very cool video ... and the "steel" was from good old USA, not some junk steel from a foreign country.

sting ry

COOL!! thanks for sharing! The amount of automation is amazing for 75 years ago!!

Cheers
Steve

92GTA

What's the oldest Corvette assembly line video? Any of 1956? All I've ever seen are still shots...

sub006

A lot of capital investment for the tooling and those BIG automatic machines coming out of the Depression. How much profit did GM make in 1936? And what were wages, I'm guessing $15 a week?

Those poor guys banging big hammers on the frames every 15 seconds or so. If I was doing that I'd practice at home 'til I could switch hands and maybe avoid repetitive arm or shoulder injury.

Don't you wish they'd powder-coated those beautiful new frames?

And finally, anybody have a similar film of C1 or C2 production in St. Louis? THAT I'd watch at least once a year forever!

AZDoug

Couple thoughts.

Yes, a LOT of capital investment to build things quickly. Not only in tooling costs, but millwright costs to get everything setup and timed and synchronized.

To build one or 10 cars costs a fortune, to build a million car cheaply, you have to spend a much larger fortune.

I wish some of those big body panel presses were still around punching out 1937 Ford pickup fenders, it would have been a lot cheaper than the relative fortune it took to get mine fixed by skilled panel beaters.

The OSHA thing crossed my mind also, I wonder how many workers got killed or maimed by making a misstep and falling in front of one of those machines.. Did they just send a cleanup crew in to hose the place down while the mess was cleaned up and keep the line going, or did they shut the line down?

The old 1927 (?) movie Metropolis comes to mind...




Doug

OldKarz

Very cool video! Ya, bet OSHA would have a field day with that.

Workin On 59

That is very interesting especially because I have a 38 Chevy coupe and my brother had a 36 coupe many years ago (in the 60s). Two weeks ago I picked up a 38 four door sedan parts car with near perfect front fenders, hood, and grill to transfer to my coupe.

Thank you very much. It's neat to see where and how those cars were made.

Doug

MikeM

What is equally amazing is as recently as 15 years ago, many of those same processes/methods and equipment were still in use at some US assembly plants. The biggest difference would be 15 years ago, almost all the manual loading/unloading and transfer of parts was done with re-programmable automation.

If you want to see a real live train wreck, just let some of that lift and carry transfer mechanism get out of cycle and watch what happens.

dkleather

Thanks for posting!! No overweight guys working in that place but the repetition had to be rough on them before long ...not to mention boring.

MikeM

Working around stamping presses is an incredibly noisy atmosphere. Today, they make you wear earplugs to work in a place like that.

firstgear

They just need a few safety fences and light curtains as well as two hand press operation buttons, they are good to go.

5thvet

Wow, great video.

skippy_ps

Hey guys, saw this video here yesterday and was directed to this one with 17 minutes tacked to the beginning. Foundry where the blocks and heads were cast as well as some great video of the cranks being forged at about 12:00 and valves being adjusted on rotating engines at about 15:20. The last 9 minutes are the same as the op.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bT6txm4RpA