MECHANICAL CONSTRUCTION / MAINTENANCE From the production of the world's first mass-produced vehicle to the present day, Goodyear has produced top-quality tires for almost all the world's leading automakers. All this thanks to our high-precision machinery.
Goodyear is one of the pioneers of automotive history. However, the Ohio-based company didn't begin with car tires. At the end of the 19th century, the automobile was an exotic niche product. The company's founders therefore began producing bicycle tires, stagecoach tires and other rubber products such as hoses for fire hoses. But Goodyear also made a major contribution to the automobile boom of the early 20th century: Henry Ford equipped the first mass-produced car, the Model T, with tires from the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company. Goodyear went on to manufacture tires for Daimler's first vehicles, becoming the world's leading tire manufacturer by 1916.
As early as 1912, the company expanded into Europe, and in 1966 the largest production plant outside the USA was built in Philippsburg, Germany. Today in Philippsburg, some 900 employees produce up to 19,000 tires a day in four shifts, 7 days a week. 60 % of these tires are used to equip new vehicles. Almost all major car and truck brands are Goodyear customers. As the tire specifications of the various manufacturers are very varied, and there is no room for maneuver in production, original equipment manufacturers demand a very high level of quality. Precision is therefore essential in the production of Goodyear tires.
To produce a tire, a first hermetic textile layer is placed on the drum of the production machine. In a second step, the machine adds steel wires to the side of this layer. These so-called "beads" hold the tire in place on the rim. The drum is then rotated, further layers added and vulcanized in an aluminum mold, into which the visible tread pattern is milled. As the entire production process is mechanized, it is imperative that the production facilities are extremely precise in order to meet the strict tolerances. All plant components involved in production, such as machines, conveyors and feeding devices, must be precisely adjusted to each other. Otherwise, inaccuracies can lead to undesirable dimensional deviations and, in the worst case, production breakdowns. To avoid this, Goodyear's maintenance specialists use FARO's Laser Tracker Vantage to capture the exact position of machine parts and their relative positions.
In addition to production safety, precise machine set-up is also decisive for the characteristics of the final product, because only if all the parts work perfectly together can the desired quality, running behaviour and cornering stability be achieved.
For Can Coskun, specialist and maintenance manager at the Philippsburg plant, the precision of the Laser Tracker is a guarantee of high product quality and customer satisfaction. "The end customer sees the influence of the Laser Tracker, because even the smallest deviation in production has a major impact on the tire's behavior."
The FARO Laser Tracker has been in use at Philippsburg since 2005, following excellent results at other Goodyear plants. The latest model, the FARO Laser Tracker Vantage, has been in use since 2013. In addition to the very high accuracy, Can Coskun appreciates the time saved by the measuring system. The Laser Tracker cuts the time needed to set up a new machine by a week. The Tracker also quickly eliminates faults caused by incorrectly adjusted system components. As a result, malfunctions on a production machine could be eliminated in a single day thanks to measurement and readjustment.
For Can Coskun, the FARO Laser Tracker is the perfect measuring instrument for use in the maintenance and servicing of Goodyear's machinery. Because it can be used very quickly and in a versatile way, it's very easy to operate. The instrument also saves time and is highly accurate.
About GOODYEAR DUNLOP TIRES GERMANY GMBH
Goodyear Dunlop Tires Germany GmbH is a subsidiary of the international tire manufacturer Goodyear. With Goodyear, Dunlop, Fulda, Sava and Debica, the tire manufacturer has five strong brands, ensuring independent product competence. The company's 7,400 employees produce around 30 million tires a year at six sites in Germany. At the Philippsburg site, up to 19,000 tires are produced every day for the demanding light vehicle sector.
Learn more: https://www.faro.com/fr-fr/produits/metrologie/faro-laser-tracker/apercu