July 12, 2007 -- There was quite a stir when Yamazaki Mazak announced in 1985 that it was going to build a machine tool production facility in Worcester. One reason for the commotion was that Yamazaki was able to benefit from the Department of Trade and Industry's Flexible Manufacturing Systems Scheme that ran from 1982 to 1986 and hence received a significant grant towards the cost of equipment. And the announcement came only a couple of years after the demise of Alfred Herbert, the world's largest machine tool-maker which had factories across the Midlands, so some had fears for the impact of the factory on the rest of the UK sector.
Worcester was not an automatic choice as the company also had sales offices in Germany and the Low Countries at that time. However in 1984 a meeting between Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone resulted in Yamazaki Mazak being invited to come to the UK and take advantage of available grants. Speaking at the official opening of the factory on June 15, 1987, the chairman of the company, Teruyuki Yamazaki, pointed out UK manufacturers should have nothing to fear because he expected that more than 80 per cent of the output would be exported. Twenty years and 17,000 machine tools later that figure is closer to 90 per cent. The factory itself created quite a stir.
It was far away from the simple assembly plant that many had expected and used its own machine tools to make machine tools. It also machined the castings, made the spindles, the turrets, the magazines and the sheet metal covers in house. It incorporated four separate FMS lines, one for laser-cutting sheet metal, one for machining large castings, one for prismatic parts, and one for spindles and shafts. Two lines, running 24 hours a day seven-days a week, were served by a tool highway, automatically replacing worn tools with back-up tooling from a tool-hive that only needed replenishment during the day shift.
There were also automated guided vehicles (AGVs) delivering kits of parts from an automatic warehouse. In keeping with company policy, the machine tools making the parts were Mazak machine tools, managed by in-house developed systems, so in effect the factory was one large working showroom. Since it was opened the factory has expanded, twice, from its original 16,000 square metres to 25,000 square metres in 1996, and this year to 29,000 square metres, giving the capacity to make 150 machines per month.
In 1987 the factory started with 103 production staff. Today there are 340, while the number of machines has gone from four models of lathe, vertical machining centres and horizontal machining centres being made to 25 at present. On the factory floor, machine units such as spindles, tailstocks, turrets and tool magazines have always been assembled off-line, then individually tested and delivered to the final assembly just-in-time. Today, to reduce final assembly floor time even further, modules of sets of covers and controls are also pre-assembled.
More than half the staff have been with the company for more than ten years and that experience is used in the more than 25 continuous improvement "kaizen" teams in operation at any time. And the factory continues to be a working showroom, with more than 2,000 customers visiting each year. Lord Walker said: "My happiest memories of this remarkable company were when they had agreed to come to Worcester and I asked 'how long do you think it will be before you build the factory?' And they gave me an incredibly short period and I said to them that you might have some difficulty achieving that.
"But not a bit, it was built on time and on budget. I then came and saw the empty factory and I said: 'how long will it take you to be in production?' I always remember the answer, it wasn't a year or two it was 71 days. I thought that was impossible In fact, they completed everything in 70 days."
Source: Birmingham Post
Source: Factiva
