84lover

Those look the best

84lover

c4 looks alot better than anything prior

ByByBMW

Excuse me for interrupting but where in the CF does it say that one must post a thread to gain credibility? I've been here since 2004 and this is the first I have heard of this.

VETTE-NV

Tool Mold Dies. I’m riveted......

Burk

Sounds like someone is jealous of the C7? The C7, especially the Z06, is without a doubt the best looking Corvette ever and most would agree. Not sure what planet you came from? If you’d seen the people doing double takes and walking circles around my car when I first got it - and the people that still to this day take video and pics of me going down the road…

skank

I can't help you. You obviously can't ascertain from all those photo's and that video what is going on with that plant expansion. As I told you before, I'm in that line of business, only I'm doing the crazy expensive projects not a rectilinear box of a building such as the BG plant. I've given you plenty of visuals to show that structure, but you don't have the ability to comprehend it where other people have.

ROUTE 66

Posing for pictures..
I can see that happening! While parked in the parking lot of the state sanitarium. I do like the color!!

JerryU

FWIW, I have worked with an seen many of the "rectilinear box" building that fabricate truck frames, cars, RR cars, ships etc etc. Also toured the Honda plant near my home several times with our ASME local section. Just recently to see their new "side by Side" new assembly line. They were pouring aluminum to make motors for the ATV's they build. In fact they recently brought ATV production from Mexico and closed one in Japan (asking racing ATV's) and all for the world are made here in SC! Need a high bay area if you want to backward integrate into casting cylinder blocks, heads, pans and frame members. Don't know if that is what GM plans to do "someday" in BG. Could be. Suggest you watch the "How It's Made" program on Ferrari manufacture!

There are certainly alternatives to doing something foolish (IMO) like making an ME and FE Vette to split the target market, which is limited for cars produced by GM. If I were on the GM Board (been on several that made order of magnitude profit improvement) would sure question that decision for a limited production product when I consider the risk to the 585,000 profitable Silverado's made last year with a push to EV. Same concern about the GM market in China gong to EVs.

Just Sayn, perhaps whatever "the crazy expensive projects you work on" don't provide the perspective for the "mundane high volume car/truck market!" Would not want Elon Musk or Koenigsegg being CEO of GM!

jefnvk

And I'm in the car making business. I have a hard time believing GM, a company who will happily nix a design that saves an hour of labor in the shop and a possible hundreds of dollars in warranty work if it costs ten seconds on an assembly line, has hidden a couple floors into their plant design which will undeniably add time to the assembly process, all in an effort to conceal for a year or two the fact they are going to continue producing a FE variant of the Corvette.

Not to mention, that only even makes sense if there is a business case to be made for having both variants, which there isn't.

RapidC84B

Oh man you just described the C7 perfectly! Everything snaps together to save a little time and parts at assembly to the detriment of servicing the car.

Jeff V.

A former co-worker of mine once told me "these cars are designed to be manufactured, not serviced". He was absolutely right.

RapidC84B

I can take apart a C5 100X blind folded with a T15 torx and a 10mm socket.... over and over and over with no ill effects. The C7 FSM has "use appropriate trim tool and pull to release tab" as the start for nearly every body/trim service operation. Every time you take the C7 apart the tabs and slots wear out a little more. My favorite are the bezels around the tail lights... the little teeth that hold them in are part of the entire bumper fascia... once the nubs wear down the bezels won't stay in. You have to take them out every time you pull the rear bumper (which also snaps on and has fusion welded tabs).

Jeff V.

But it pops on in 30 seconds at the factory. That's the end of GMs concern for the process.

I'm looking at retrofitting a PDR into my car. That's going to require running some wires. I really should pull the dash to do some of that. I wouldn't blink an eye at doing that on my older cars. Then I look at how the C7 is put together, especially those clips you mention, and I'm like, hell no. I'll find some other way.

It'll be very interesting to see how the C8 is put together. At this point, that interests me more than how the car looks or performs.

jefnvk

Yep. Last place I worked was heavy on GM programs, we had the serviceability-v-manufacturing argument a lot. 90% of the fights went to manufacturing ease.

skank

Jevnvk, The intent to show you and the rest of the forum the plant expansion square footage measurements is for everybody to understand the scale and or magnitude of the size and enlargement of the now 3,123,000 (plus or minus Sq. Ft.) Corvette Plant. As per explanations in my prior posts of this huge expansion, the original plant was 950,000 Sq.Ft. and the total now has the plant as tripled in size. Per member Elegant info sources, this huge new plant with all the new expensive tooling and equipment inside is near one billion $ in capital expenditure. This massive expenditure to me is simply the biggest indicator of why this plant will make more than one vehicle. It escapes me and many others why you and others can't comprehend that. I'm not wasting my time anymore on this. I suggest you take the full plant tour when they open up tours next year or whenever they open up all three main areas (original single level old plant, two level manifold connector building, and four level new main plant). You will finally come to grips with the scale of what has been built. Keep this post in mind for future acknowledgement of the facts. This information is correct.

OnPoint

How much new/additional space does the new paint shop take? How much new/additional space does the new engine build center take (since they moved that from Wixom to Bowling Green)?

Honest questions as I don't think I've seen/heard how much room those two new efforts comprise.

jefnvk

I don't have an issue comprehending that it may make more than one vehicle. I have a hard time comprehending your insistence that there are three levels that are hidden to conceal the true square footage, which would undoubtedly be a continued FE Corvette, hence the need for secrecy.

When I Google Earth it myself, the square footage comes out to roughly the 1.7m sq ft that GM claims. I don't look for conspiracy when an obvious answer is obvious.

Foosh

You're either a compulsive liar, unhinged, or you just can't read.

In this very thread, as well as in many other threads going back many months now when you started playing this recording over and over again, I and many others have acknowledged that the massive investment certainly suggests that GM has long-term additional plans for BGA, up to an including another vehicle. In response, we've simply countered that there is no business case for two-seat ME and FE Corvettes at the same time for a manufacturer that relies upon volume production.

Yes, WE COMPREHEND!!!!!! But, it doesn't make the case you want it to make.

jefnvk

And, unlike a few here, if and when GM announces "Fooled you, we really do have four levels and 4m sq ft of manufacturing capacity at BGA", I will fully admit I was wrong. I'm not counting on having to do that, though, and I am also willing to step up in the not-out-of-probability event of adding a manual happens.

Shaka

If it wasn't that way, cars would be very expensive. The Italians seem to manage somehow. Major work on Ferraris is easy but not cheap. Modern cars need highly qualified technicians (Electronic diagnosis ) which are hard to find.
Designing parts that perform many duties replace many parts. It offsets high warranty costs. My last car was very cheap to build but expensive to design and repair. My new car is the reverse.

There is a race in the automotive industry in "Design Management" and which computer system does it best. The main issues and debates included the topics of design thinking, strategic design management, design leadership, and product service systems. Design management was influenced by the following design trends: sustainable design, inclusive design, interactive design, design probes, product clinics, and co-design. It was also influenced by the later management trends of open innovation and design thinking.

I have a list of most of the courses and clinics that GM engineers have attended in the last decade. I focused on chassis design and materials science. The C8 is going to set a standard in low production specialized vehicles.

If you are interested, read "Design Management" by Michael Farr, which is a comprehensive work on design management. His thoughts on system theory and project management led to a framework of how to deal with design as a business function at the corporate management level by providing the language and methodology to effectively manage it. All engineering is very specialized and the old fashioned global engineers have all but disappeared.

The first international research project on design management, the TRIAD research project, was initiated by Earl Powell, then president of DMI and the Harvard Business School in 1989. In the same year Earl Powell and Thomas Walton, Ph.D. developed the Design Management Review and DMI published the first issue which became GM's Planned Evaluation and Review Technique. (PERT Charts). The publication solely focuses on design management and has become the flagship publication of the discipline.

The term "Architectural Management " was coined by the architects Brunton, Baden Hellard and Boobyer. They highlighted the tension and synergy between the management of individual projects (job management) and the management of the business (office management). Alert: Skank. Corvette is actually leading GM in DM starting with the C5. Hill robbing the truck divisions of expensive train drive tooling.

GM has just renewed a contract with Seamans which I think is a very bad idea. GM cars are as difficult to repair as German cars and overly complicated electronically. If the C8 fails, blame it on the Germans.
FIAT Chrysler uses IBM. Mercedes bought Chrysler, mainly for because of their CATIA Dassault (French) system. FIAT brought it back to IMB. Mercedes and BMW use Siemans.