jagamajajaran

On Thursday, August 3, I had the privilege of listening to Jeff Lamarche and Kai Spande talk about Kai, the new paint shop project, and a couple of other plant related topics. For those who were not able to take advantage of the opportunity to hear from the outgoing and incoming Bowling Green Assembly Plant Managers, the following are a few of the highlights.

Jeff Lamarche begain with the following comments regarding his time as Plant Manager:

Jeff also spoke highly of Kai when he said,

After Jeff's introductory remarks, Kai shared some things about his personal life, various Corvettes that he has owned, and his career with GM. Kai is married and has two children: a 16 year old daughter and a 13 year old son. The first car he purchased after he started working for GM in 1991 was a 1978 Silver Anniversary Corvette. After that, he purchased a 1964 Corvette Convertible, made its small block a big block, and completed a frame off restoration with his own hands (everything except the paint). He also owned a 1969, numbers matching, 427, 4 speed, side pipe Corvette as well as a 1999 Corvette. That was about the time that he started his family and Corvette took a back seat for a while basically because Corvettes don't have back seats. Kai has also driven company supplied Corvettes at times. And if you're driving around Bowling Green now, you might come across Kai driving his 1937 street rod pickup.

As already stated, Kai has been with GM for almost 25 years and has been a plant manager since 2009. His responsibilities managing a $150,000,000 Euro annual production and working with almost 1000 people under his leadership translates into the experience to manage the production and labor force of the Bowling Green Assembly. Additionally, the Wixom Performance Build Center was one of his responsibilities and he was on the leading edge of the transfer of the Performance Build Center to Bowling Green. In describing what he brings to the table as the new plant manager, Kai made the following comments:

Jeff and Kai both spoke about the new Corvette paint shop project. Kai stated that in his history with GM, he has been responsible for well over $1 billion in investments in powertrain operations. He assures us that he has the ability to get the job done and is motivated to do so. He also stated that the paint shop project needs to go off without a hitch and he will make sure that it does.

Since Jeff Lamarche has been at the forefront of the project up to this point, he provided some additional information that I think is worth sharing. The paint shop at the Bowling Green Assembly is actually GM's oldest paint shop. As they work toward building the new paint shop, they are undoing some legacy issues, which will result in paint quality that will match the quality of the vehicle that they are already producing. He fully expects the paint to match the quality of any of Corvette's competitors, including Porsche, Ferrari, and others. An investment of approximately $440 million with a 10 year amortization, with current production volume, translates into an investment of about $2,500 per Corvette. That is just the investment in the facility and not in its operation. This being the case, Jeff said that the new paint quality has to be nothing but the best.

The new paint shop design is a purpose driven design. It is a clean sheet of paper and as such will provide what is needed in order to get the best paint finish possible on composite material and panels (as opposed to metal and full body vehicle paint processes). Painting plastic and composites is difficult. The surfaces are not smooth and it's definitely not the same as painting steel. Painting composites is much more difficult than painting steel. Jeff said that they have learned a lot with the C7 and that with a clean sheet of paper, they can do things that they couldn't do before. They have learned what to do differently in the new paint shop, from preparation of the material to the primer coat to the top coat to the clear coat. With every step, Jeff said that are things that they are putting into the design that are going to be spectacular. He made it clear that he wasn't saying that what they do today is bad, but that when you have a clean sheet of paper, you have the opportunity to go places you've never gone before. And that, my friends, is exciting! Jeff stated that they are going to go places they have never been and, that in lab tests, the results are like nothing anyone has ever seen before with the Corvette.

The target date for the new paint facility to be online is the fall of 2017. Once online, plant tours will include a visit to the paint shop. A tour route is being designed that will include a path outside of the clean room where employees process through air showers, making sure they are properly clothed, and keeping dirt, hair, and other potential contaminates out. This path will give tour participants a view through windows that will face a paint booth where paint robots will be seen in action.

One final note. Jeff also talked about the change in the composite material that took place toward the end of the 2015 Corvette production cycle. The new composite material is actually the composite that is used on the Corvette racing cars. It is a stronger, but lighter composite that also allows paint to lay better than the previous composite material.

Coming away from the meeting I had a deeper appreciation for what Jeff Lamarche has done during his time as plant manager as well as a very optimistic outlook for the future with Kai Spande at the helm. As incredible as the C7 is, I believe the best for Corvette is still to come!

Vetteman Jack

Good article and hopefully the paint quality will be significantly improved when the new facility comes online. The only question is how will this affect the bottom line price for the Corvette.

Len44

"Jeff also talked about the change in the composite material that took place toward the end of the 2015 Corvette production cycle. The new composite material is actually the composite that is used on the Corvette racing cars. It is a stronger, but lighter composite that also allows paint to lay better than the previous composite material."

Huh? Would like to know more about this comment. When, exactly did this happen?

\Boost Monkey/

Same here.

At what 15' production dates was this actually implemented? I have a very end of the model year 15'... wondering if it has the newer panels.

rcooper

Good stuff, Jag. Thanks for posting this information. Gives me hope that if I am lucky enough to get another new Corvette that I won't have the Sunkist option .

jagamajajaran

I do not know the exact date of transition. However, it is reasonable to say that the change started when they started producing the very first 2016 models. It could have taken place in April when they started producing the first 2016 pilot cars. Since the 2016 started with a rolling start (meaning they were still building 2015s as they began to build 2016s), I am guessing the changeover was complete by that time.

Len44

That sounds logical, and likely. Thanks for the informative response.

kenrobb

The new paint plant will be NW of the existing plant facility sort of west of the area the new cars are parked for transport loading. They have moved some dirt for entrance roads, etc. So painted parts will be "transported" to the assembly line some how. Thanks for posting the talk as it was hard to take-in all the information as it was said. I was surprised no one asked if this will get rid of orange peel. I would assume answer would have been YES.

jagamajajaran

I'm pretty sure I heard someone ask about orange peel which prompted Jeff's reply that the paint quality would rival Porsche, Ferrari, etc.

JoeD-C8

Also wish they would pay closer attention to under the hood! Paint quality there bordering on crap.

vetehead

Jeremy, thank you for sharing this...After what you went thru as an early adopter of a C7 as myself, I would guess this feels some what of a victory.Here is to our next Vettes having a flawless paint job

jagamajajaran

This is why I had my hood and inner fenders cleared and smoothed.

It is, indeed!

AORoads

I haven't seen a lot of new Ferraris, but just know that Porsche has orange peel as do most other cars (even tho they are "steel" cars). Just go to any showroom and look.

nmvettec7

The paint on my 2014 Porsche Cayman 981 is excellent, as I would say outstanding. Smooth as ice. No orange peel evident at all.

Damian M

I was at a mercedes dealership this weekend, helping my daughter buy a c300, I was looking at all the cars in the showroom (e class to s class) and I couldn't believe how many had orange peel, people were still buying them up like crazy. I think the general public really don't really notice it, I pointed this out to my daughter and she didn't realize this until i showed it to her.

bbrown450

not poo pooing your efforts op but saying that he does not consider what is going on now (2014-2016) "Bad" is scary to think

Corvette ED

My car was build on June 12th and my paint is very good!!!

jagamajajaran

I don't even smell any poop. I'm just the reporter here.