F&I Management & Training

It's something of a British success story that Toyota's Burnaston plant near Derby has been awarded the contract to build a hybrid model, which was previously the preserve of just two high-tech plants in Tsutsumi, Japan and Kentucky, USA.

The Burnaston factory has been through the mill during the recession and this Auris hybrid is a vote of confidence in the workers and management of the 18-year-old plant.

The Auris hybrid will be produced on the same production line as the current Auris and Avensis models and there are 149 new processes, 395 new parts, 28 new pieces of production machinery and modifications to a further 40 machines and tools to make the petrol/electric hybrid.

In addition Toyota's engine plant at Deeside has been modified and equipped to produce the 1.8-litre Atkinson Cycle petrol engine that powers the hybrid.

It's a measure of the plant's efficiency and logistics planning that the hybrid will take just 6.6 minutes more to build than the 24 hours it takes to build a conventional Auris.

Toyota has trained all its 4,000 staff at Burnaston and Derby in hybrid production processes and more than 80 per cent of the production staff have elected to take a newly introduced level 2 National Vocational Qualification (NVQ) in hybrid vehicles.

With Toyota quality under the spotlight in recent months, preparations for the hybrid have been extensive. The hybrid range has the lowest warranty costs of any Toyota and the company is aiming to keep it that way.

In build safety and quality are largely a function of ensuring the correct assembly and tightening of critical braking and high-voltage electrical connections. The inverter alone has 29 connectors and there are new computer-controlled vision checking system for welds on high voltage cables.

The integrity of the braking system is inspected with a new endoscope system which carries a camera into the inside of the brake pipe.

At the end of the line there is a new procedure at the test track to ensure the hybrid is examined in all its modes of operation including regenerative braking.