The AutoAlliance facility in Flat Rock, Michigan manufactures the Ford Mustang and the Mazda6. More than 3,700 employees work at this 2.7 million square foot operation. AutoAlliance makes extensive use of CC-Link networking in the manufacture of approximately 1,200 vehicles per day. This application article describes the body assembly and paint operations. More than 400 robots are used to make over 6,000 body welds on each vehicle. 61 robots and 10 automatic paint machines apply sealants, sound deadening and 19 paint colors.
The ease of assembly line start-up and excellent reliability of CC-Link has translated into a highly productive manufacturing facility. The speed at which these new lines were installed and commissioned resulted in significant savings in comparison to other networked systems used previously. Control engineers at AutoAlliance have commented that they have had no CC-Link network failures but that they have experienced a number of failures with Ethernet networks and with 2 other commonly used fieldbus networks.
Conveyor System
A series of conveyors, controlled via CC-Link, move car bodies through the numerous welding, assembly, and painting stations. Each vehicle travels approximately 13 miles in the course of production. Pictured here is a Power and Free (P&F) conveyor. The motors that power the conveyors throughout the facility are controlled by Mitsubishi VFD Drives communicating via CC-Link.
Typical Control Panel
Shown here is one of the control panels for the Mustang subassembly within the Body Shop portion of the AutoAlliance facility. It handles the control for the assembly of the driver’s side panel of the Mustang auto body. This panel includes a Mitsubishi Automation Controller with five CC-Link network masters. One of the five networks provides communication between other control panels within the body shop. The other CC-Link networks handle control of the material handling equipment, robots and welding operations described below. There are approximately 125 control panels of this type within the Mustang Body Shop. The Mazda Body Shop in this Auto-Alliance facility also uses approximately 125 control panels of this type to provide similar control functions for Mazda assembly.
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