{"id":981,"date":"2014-12-29T19:46:53","date_gmt":"2014-12-29T19:46:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/?p=981"},"modified":"2014-12-29T19:46:53","modified_gmt":"2014-12-29T19:46:53","slug":"2014-year-of-discovery-automotive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/?p=981","title":{"rendered":"2014 &#8211; Year of Discovery&#8230;&#8230;..#automotive"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"lazysocialbuttons\" data-float=\"left\" data-buttons=\"google,twitter,facebook\" data-twshareurl=\"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/?p=981\" data-twtext=\"\" data-shareurl=\"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/?p=981\" data-fbhideflyout=\"false\" data-backgroundtype=\"light\"><\/div><p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Jaguar Factory Tour - 1961\" width=\"584\" height=\"438\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/lKJPFRNO344?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>This year has been an extremely exciting &amp; challenging one for me personally. In January 2014 I signed a 12 month contract with Tata Technologies as Lead Engineer in Exterior Trim developing &amp; bringing to production Jaguar Land Rovers&#8217;s Freelander replacement the new &#8216;Discovery Sport&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>In January I was based in TTL&#8217;s Coventry office but spent a lot of time at JLR&#8217;s Browns Lane plant in the West Midlands, historical home of Jaguar Cars &amp; now utilised as a Pilot Plant for small scale production.<\/p>\n<p>Walking into Browns Lane was a great experience personally as I met many old friends from JLR having worked on the Range Rover Sport Programme. Although it is a large organization employing many thousands its amazing how many people you get to know working on a project for 18 months.<\/p>\n<p>The pilot build is known as VP build &amp; this stage of the process is very much a learning process. Some trim parts are still not &#8216;off tool&#8217; &amp; its all about capturing issues via the Automated Issues Management system. This AIMs system is used to track issues &amp; ensure the proper fix is put in place before closure. It provides visibility to Senior Management &amp; its administration is one of the Lead Engineer&#8217;s key tasks along with developing engineering solutions &amp; working with key suppliers to ensure timely delivery of quality parts. Most issues require a PACN (to support financial justification) &amp; a Engineering Release to implement the change. As most Engineers are responsible for numerous parts time is rapidly eroded before its time for the next build &#8211; Hard Tool Functional Build (HTFB)<\/p>\n<p>This build took place at JLR&#8217;s Halewood plant where the Discovery Sport is to be mass produced &amp; which was to be my base for the next 8 months.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Jaguar \/ Land Rover Halewood Plant Factory Footage\" width=\"584\" height=\"329\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/PUvgWciLpQU?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Halewood is a large plant which covers several square miles &amp; employs over 8,000 people. \u00a0Most of the Product Coaches &amp; Line Engineers were involved in the Browns Lane builds so there were many familiar faces at Halewood as well as plenty new ones. Halewood is one of JLR&#8217;s centres of excellence &amp; the Engineering knowledge here is second to none.<\/p>\n<p>Over the next 8 months we embarked on a number of builds increasing in numbers &amp; complexity. This is a very stressful period for all &amp; the nearer Volume Launch approaches the pressure piles on.<\/p>\n<p>It was with a mixture of relief &amp; a great sense of achievement \u00a0when Volume Launch in December was achieved and cars began rolling off the production line at a rate of one every 40 seconds !!<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Land Rover Discovery Sport off-road review\" width=\"584\" height=\"329\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/I2lLp1It2pM?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>It is important to recognise the economic importance of this model; Tata have invested hundreds of millions of pounds in this venture which has created several thousand jobs at Halewood &amp; employed hundreds of thousands in the wider supply chain. With JLR&#8217;s commitment to source 60% of parts within a 40 mile radius the importance to the Regional Economy cannot be underestimated.<\/p>\n<p>To play a small part in this great venture &amp; to help take the Discovery Sport from initial concept to volume production brings a great sense of pride &amp; achievement.<br \/>\n<a href=\"mailto:chris@amberhill.biz\">chris@amberhill.biz<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\">www.amberhill.biz<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.twitter.com\/projectsguru\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/twitter-badges.s3.amazonaws.com\/follow_bird_us-a.png\" alt=\"Follow projectsguru on Twitter\" width=\"100\" height=\"36\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/chrisrob9999\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/img\/webpromo\/btn_viewmy_120x33.png\" alt=\"View Chris Robinson's profile on LinkedIn\" width=\"120\" height=\"33\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><!-- Facebook Badge START --><a style=\"font-family: 'lucida grande',tahoma,verdana,arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-variant: normal; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; color: #3b5998; text-decoration: none;\" title=\"Projectsguru.co.uk\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/Projectsgurucouk\/179845275377478\" target=\"_TOP\">Projectsguru.co.uk<\/a><br \/>\n<a title=\"Projectsguru.co.uk\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/Projectsgurucouk\/179845275377478\" target=\"_TOP\"><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"border: 0px;\" src=\"https:\/\/badge.facebook.com\/badge\/179845275377478.2524.1626262894.png\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a><br \/>\n<a style=\"font-family: 'lucida grande',tahoma,verdana,arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; font-variant: normal; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; color: #3b5998; text-decoration: none;\" title=\"Make your own badge!\" href=\"https:\/\/en-gb.facebook.com\/advertising\" target=\"_TOP\">Promote your Page too<\/a><!-- Facebook Badge END --><br \/>\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\">\/\/ <![CDATA[\namazon_ad_tag=\"amberhassoci-21\";  amazon_ad_width=\"728\";  amazon_ad_height=\"90\";  amazon_color_background=\"EFEFCC\";  amazon_color_border=\"07178B\";  amazon_color_logo=\"FFFFFF\";  amazon_color_link=\"A43907\";  amazon_ad_logo=\"hide\";  amazon_ad_title=\"projectsguru store\";\n\/\/ ]]><\/script><br \/>\n<script src=\"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.co.uk\/s\/asw.js\" type=\"text\/javascript\"><\/script><\/p>\n\n<!-- AddThis Button BEGIN -->\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\">\nvar addthis_pub = '';\nvar addthis_language = 'en';var addthis_options = 'email, favorites, digg, delicious, myspace, google, facebook, reddit, live, more';\n<\/script>\n<div class=\"addthis_container\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.addthis.com\/bookmark.php?v=20\" onmouseover=\"return addthis_open(this, '', 'https%3A%2F%2Fwww.amberhill.biz%2Fblog%2F%3Fp%3D981', '2014+%26%238211%3B+Year+of+Discovery%26%238230%3B%26%238230%3B..%23automotive')\" onmouseout=\"addthis_close()\" onclick=\"return addthis_sendto()\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/s7.addthis.com\/static\/btn\/lg-share-en.gif\" width=\"125\" height=\"16\" border=\"0\" alt=\"Bookmark and Share\"\/><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"http:\/\/s7.addthis.com\/js\/200\/addthis_widget.js\"><\/script><\/div>\n<!-- AddThis Button END -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This year has been an extremely exciting &amp; challenging one for me personally. In January 2014 I signed a 12 month contract with Tata Technologies as Lead Engineer in Exterior Trim developing &amp; bringing to production Jaguar Land Rovers&#8217;s Freelander &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/?p=981\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[103],"tags":[5,134,124,104,25,111,6,137,125,48,127,16,36,123,128],"class_list":["post-981","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-automotive","tag-pmot","tag-automotive","tag-business","tag-cars","tag-change-management","tag-contracting","tag-design-process","tag-engineering","tag-innovation","tag-leadership","tag-lean","tag-manufacturing","tag-new-product-development","tag-project-management","tag-supply-chain"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/981","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=981"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/981\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":983,"href":"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/981\/revisions\/983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amberhill.biz\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}