mwvw
24-02-2009, 03:05 PM
If you get a chance a factory and museum vist at Ingolstadt (about 70km outside of Munich) is well worth a visit. We took a group of engineering students last week. The technology is facinating to watch as you get up really close to the line. The amount of robots (or roberts, as our guide said) assembling the A3 body shell shows how far the car producers have advanced with technology - roof panels being placed with a tolerance of 0.2mm then laser welded into place to give a more rigid body shell - front and rear screens having adhesive applied before location onto the body using lasers to locate positions etc etc. Still a fair amount of manual input especially in the interior fitting.
The museum is also a gret place to visit where you can take a load of photos (unlike inside the factory where cameras are banned). You get to see the very first Horst car (forerunner of Audi), to the car made for I Robot. They made three - one for the crash scene, one cut in half for the interior shots and the running car. As our guide told us it only went at a max of 25mph - the camera never lies!!!!!
We also managed a visit to (if I'm alowed to mention it ) the BMW factory.
Over all we were well impressed and I would recomend these visits to any one.
By the way, if you pick your new Audi up from the factory you get a free factory visit.:D
The museum is also a gret place to visit where you can take a load of photos (unlike inside the factory where cameras are banned). You get to see the very first Horst car (forerunner of Audi), to the car made for I Robot. They made three - one for the crash scene, one cut in half for the interior shots and the running car. As our guide told us it only went at a max of 25mph - the camera never lies!!!!!
We also managed a visit to (if I'm alowed to mention it ) the BMW factory.
Over all we were well impressed and I would recomend these visits to any one.
By the way, if you pick your new Audi up from the factory you get a free factory visit.:D