We have often seen the Luxury brand invite their customer to see how their car is being assembled at the Plant and to follow the same path, Tata Nano invites some lucky customer and me to visit Tata Motors Nano Assembly Plant at Sanand near Ahmedabad, Gujarat.
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Girish Wagh (Right), Senior Vice President
Video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqERM04jwtA
Gala Night before Plant Visit
To celebrate the success of #TheChosenOnes campaign, A day before Tata Motors threw the party at Novotel Hotel including some fun activities and drummer night.
About Tata Nano Sanand Assembly Plant
The plant is supposed to set up at Singur, West Bengal but after protest from local farmers they decided to move it’s complete plant from Singur to Sanand. They dissemble the plant and re-setup at Gujarat. The Plant is spread over 1100 acres land in Sanand which includes complete assembly units and vendor areas.
The Plant uses 15% of renewal energy from Kutch Wind mills and also stored rain water in a small lake.
The plant is designed to produce Nano in every 58 secs which can be changes based on the demand. Currently they’re producing car in every 2 mins. The company took special care for the Nature and you’ll see the greenery everywhere in the plant. They’re also planning to increase the use of renewal energy which can be obtained from Solar energy. The plant doesn’t discharge any waste. To take care of their employees, they have big Canteen, Fire Brigade, medical facility and training centre where both new and existing can be trained.
To reduce the cost, they have vendor park where they store key component which needed at the car manufacturing.
The Whole plant is divided into 5 sections: Press Shop, Weld Shop, Paint Shop, Engine Shop & Trim Chassis & Filament Shop.
Press Shop: Here Big sheets of Steel are forged into various shapes like gates, body, bottom part etc. All this work has been done by the Robots in a closed chamber.
Weld Shop: Here the parts that were forged in a press shop are weld here. They together create the structure of Nano.
Paint Shop: This area is restricted and they didn’t allow me to enter as single dust particle can damage the complete paint work. Most of the paint work is done here, including top coat.
They didn’t allow me to photograph in Press Shop, Weld Shop and Paint shop because of PATENTS. So I can’t share much detail here. All the shops are interconnected with the help of conveyor belts and sky bridge.
Engine Shop: Here, the Engine is married by the body. This is the toughest section where employee have to join the engine with body under the given time. The conveyor belt continuously moving forward and this is where you see the precision of Tata Motors workers.
Trims, Chassis & Filament: This is where Nano gets its all accessories including seats, lights, steering wheel, dashboard, AC, Tyres etc.
Testing
Once everything is ready, the car is sent for the testing where much testing has been done including the speed test. The purpose of this test is to check whether everything is perfectly placed or not. Every car has to be gone with this testing and after that the car is sent to Post Dispatch Inspection (PDI).
Within the premises, Tata Motors has test track which simulates various road conditions like potholes, Rugged roads, speed breakers and water puddles.
To test maneuver of the car, Tata Motors setup Driving test track which simulates city driving conditions. I personally drive the Tata Nano Gen X Nano Manual on this track and driving is pretty easy thanks to New Power steering and small turning radius.
It’s always fascinating when you’re standing with big robots who precisely build the car and also the employees out there who is working hard to match the speed of the robots. And good to see the test drive track they setup in the plant to simulate the driving conditions inside the plant.
The Chosen Ones
The company held the #TheChosenOnes contest where they invite lucky customers to visit their Plant, not only visit the plant, but Tata Motors delivered the car right at the plant.
I’ve talked with Vishal Gugle from Pune, he was the lucky winner who got a chance to see the Tata Nano plant.
Q: How’s your experience with Tata Motors Plant?
A: It was pretty good to see the overall plant, I’ve seen this before only on TV. I’m thankful to Tata Motors for inviting me to part of this campaign.
Q: Why you bought the Tata Nano?
A: I was looking for car with easy to ride in the city and also cost less in terms of both cost and maintenance. The Tata Nano is the perfect choice for my Wife and with Auto Transmission my wife can ride the car without any hassle in the Pune city.
Q: What you want to say about Tata as a Brand?
A: This is my second Tata Car, before that I own Tata Safari. I like to say a Tata Improved lot in recent years. They’re no more the company who produce Taxi cars, they’re equally good with a personal car.
Q: How you feel to be part of The Chosen One?
A: I just filled the form and luckily got the call from the Tata Motors. Tata arranges the tickets for me and my family to visit the plant. I’m thankful to them for the wonderful two days.
More Pics of Tata Nano Plant
Great work man. One of the best pieces of Online journalism I have seen in a long time. Very comprehensive with ample use of multimedia.
How can i visit nano plant in sanand (process)