Ford has started the mass assembly of vehicle drive battery packs in three different sizes for exclusive use in Ford’s new generation of electric vehicles, the Ford Explorer and Ford Capri, with both vehicles built at the Cologne Electric Vehicle Center.
Ford says that as part of a transformative $2 billion investment in the historic Cologne plant, the fully digitalised new facility ensures high quality standards, efficiency and a significant reduction in transportation, as well as full alignment with vehicle assembly at the same location.
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The Cologne plant has been a cornerstone of Ford production in Europe for almost 100 years.
The new Cologne battery assembly plant includes 180 newly installed robots which weld, glue and screw the battery housing together and equip it with up to 12 battery modules. A total of around 2,775 individual parts are assembled into a battery pack on a 2 km-long highly automated production line.
The new battery plant also represents another step in Ford of Europe’s capacity expansion towards an electric future. Ford electric vehicles are also being produced at Ford Otosan’s assembly plant in Craiova, Romania, and Kocaeli, Turkey, with electric drive units produced at Ford’s facility at Halewood, UK.
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