Text/Car Bright
Photo/From official
To eat a delicious egg, you don't have to know which hen landed it. But to pay attention to a car of interest, it is necessary to understand the materials behind it, the production process, and the technical level - after all, under the bright and thick body sheet metal, it is difficult to see the quality of the material and process with the naked eye.
When it comes to "conscience cars", the first thing that comes to everyone's mind is mostly French cars. The most prominent French car in recent times is the Extraordinary Ersa C5 X.
As the only model in China that is "made in Chengdu and sold globally", what is the real level of Dongfeng Citroen Versailles C5X's manufacturing process and materials? Is it worthy of the words "car of conscience"?
Recently, I walked into the Chengdu factory of DPCA and observed the manufacturing process of the Versailles C5X up close.
The visit coincided with the cooling of the weather on consecutive days, and the wind band in March was a bit chilly. Riding a battery car through the Dragon Factory in Nuoda, I couldn't see a few people...
I didn't see many people in the factory
The production process of a Versailles C5X can be divided into five links: stamping, welding, painting, final assembly, and quality inspection. Since the whole body must be tightly wrapped to enter the painting workshop, we only visited the stamping, welding, final assembly and final assembly links this time, and experienced the final quality inspection link.
Field observation, in addition to the assembly and quality inspection links can see more workers, stamping, welding, including painting and other links, are composed of robots composed of automatic production lines to complete - large stamping machines or robots, waving mechanical arms up and down busy.
Even in the assembly workshop, even the "chassis" and the body "docking", which used to be done by people, are completed by robots.
In the stamping workshop, we can see rows of fully enclosed yellow houses, consoles with various color buttons are set up outside the house, large stamping machines work in an orderly manner in the house, and the whole workshop is relatively quiet. According to reports, this production line is fully automatic, fully enclosed, the noise control is below 83 decibels, while ensuring zero emissions.
This is indeed not the same as my impression of visiting the stamping workshops of other factories in the past, where large presses make a huge impact sound and stamping parts run all over the assembly line.
(The body-in-white of the stamped model, 96% of the body is covered with double-sided galvanized steel)
The stamping line of The DPCA Chengdu factory is not only fully enclosed and fully automatic, but also requires integrated stamping molding, and the stamping accuracy is controlled within 0.01 mm.
Speaking of the most typical part of the integrated molding is the door, the door of the Versailles C5X is stamped with a sheet of steel, unlike many models that have welds in the middle. In addition to the high precision requirements of the stamping process, and the use of a five-axis CNC milling machine to process the body cover mold, in the parts that need manual grinding, will be completed by long-term training of eight-level fitters to achieve high quality standards.
Entering the welding workshop, this welding line is still 100% automated. On a body-in-white, 491 robots will work together to complete more than 5,800 solder joints using laser welding. And in order to ensure the accuracy of welding, the laser online detection process is finally used - with a laser measuring head, the body-in-white is non-contact photo measurement to prevent the outflow of unqualified products.
Perhaps many people do not know the difference between laser welding and solder joint welding, in fact, it is like the difference between "zipper" and "button".
In order to ensure the rigidity and strength of the body, the Versailles C5 X uses a laser welding process in the roof part (including A-pillar and C-pillar), with a total length of 10 meters! And I noticed that unlike many factory open production lines, this welding line is built in a transparent house, it is also fully enclosed management, sitting on the battery car, we can only see the robot silently busy.
The whole scene does not look as good as the robots placed in the open air in many depots, and the scene of arms flying and welding flowers splashing is shocking, but it is really quiet and very secure.
And to my surprise, the installation of sunroofs and windows on a car is generally placed in the final assembly link, and the glass is manually installed by the workers one by one, but the Versailles C5X is completed in the welding process. It is automatically grasped and glued by the robot, and after high temperature baking, the bonding strength reaches 425 MPa, so that the sunroof and the body are tightly sewn and firm.
Since the painting workshop cannot be visited, the information from the factory shows that it uses 68 robots to produce fully automatically, realizing the automatic spraying inside and outside the vehicle, ensuring high brightness and thickness. At the same time, the use of water-based paint (water as a dispersed compound, low formaldehyde content) not only reduces the emission of the manufacturing process, but also for the owner, it is not as potential health risks as oil-based paint.
The technical content of the assembly workshop reflects the "process integration" and "quality management" - that is, all kinds of parts are in place, how to quickly and efficiently "save" a car, but also to ensure that there are no mistakes.
On the assembly line of the Versailles C5X, various parts are accurately connected to the assembly line through aerial catenary, floor conveyor chain and automated handling trolley (i.e. AGV trolley), and the parts collection rate is 95%. That is to say, 95% of the parts are automatically transported by the system to the workstation, and no one is required to transport, so in addition to the people next to the assembly line, there is no one on the clean road in the workshop, which is not the same as the busy scene of "driving a forklift and running all over the ground" in our impression.
Secondly, a major task on the assembly line is to combine the body and chassis, and generally this process requires at least two or three people to work together to complete. However, on the final assembly line of the Versailles C5X, the chassis and body are fully automatically assembled, automatically servo tightening, without manual interference, which not only ensures accuracy but also improves efficiency.
After the final assembly is completed, the factory will keep the tightening data of the bolts for backup for 10 years for later data investigation and analysis. At the same time, each part is stamped with a digital code for quality traceability.
In the quality inspection process, each Factory Versailles C5 X has to undergo 241 tests, and it is also driven by experienced driving engineers to a 4.5 km comprehensive road for dynamic testing.
Including high-speed, ramp, washboard road, gravel road, rain and other 21 kinds of road conditions road test test, each factory vehicle must undergo dynamic testing. This test road is located in the DPCA factory, and I also followed a car through the whole experience, and also experienced the PHC hydraulic suspension again, and the comfort of walking on the ground when pressing over bumpy roads such as washboard roads and pothole roads.
Domestic and foreign collinear production, to meet European standards
After visiting the factory, my biggest feeling is that although the French car is currently in the "secondary entrepreneurship" stage and the sales volume is still at a relatively low point, the manufacturing level of the factory is indeed at the first-class level - this may be one of the most automated factories in China that I have ever seen. In addition to the final assembly and quality inspection links, all other production links are fully enclosed and fully automatic, and this degree of "sparse population" may not be achieved in many luxury brand factories.
The role of this DPCA Chengdu plant is the main production base of high-end passenger cars of Dongfeng Group and STEELANTIS Group. Currently, the plant is also the only production location for all Versailles C5 Xs on the domestic and international markets.
Yes, from the observation results, the domestic version and the overseas version are indeed collinear production, the manufacturing process is the same, and there is no difference in design.
(The picture is the famous PHC adaptive hydraulic suspension, which mechanically achieves a multi-stage damping variable effect)
From the interview, it was learned that the Versailles C5X supplied to the European market, mainly a plug-in hybrid version (the Versailles C5X in the European market has three power types of 1.2T, 1.6T and plug-and-mix version), has been exported to many countries and regions in Europe, and is expected to reach a scale of 20,000 vehicles this year.
Domestic and international versions of the Versailles C5X collinear production require uniform quality and safety standards. It is well known that Europe's car access safety standards are the most stringent in the world, and Europeans are also concerned about handling. So versailles C5 X is actually using European safety and handling standards to build domestic cars.
The most intuitive embodiment is in the Versailles C5 X body materials and processes, for example, its front suspension triangle arm is made of aluminum, its engine cover, front and rear anti-collision beams, energy-absorbing boxes, steering knuckles are made of aluminum, its full body 96% of the covering is double-sided galvanized steel plate, high-strength steel accounted for more than 80%, its roof laser welding line more than 10 meters.
In the previous domestic C-NCAP collision, it not only obtained a five-star rating, but even in several collisions such as front, side, front 40 degrees, not only the A-pillar, B-pillar and crew compartment were almost not deformed, even the glass was not broken... It's like a college student, completing junior high school exam questions.
Really using global standards to build domestic cars, this is the "conscience" of versailles C5X.
Driving value view
At the end of the factory tour, I happened to see a slogan on the wall: Hard work and hard work to establish a new life...
From its establishment in 1992 to this year, The Dragon Company has reached its inception. From the peak of annual sales of 700,000 vehicles fell to the lowest point of annual sales of 50,000 vehicles, and then climbed up step by step to exceed 100,000 vehicles in 2021. Then in 2022, it may break through the 200,000 mark, step by step, and the dragon will come back again.
Among them, the Versailles C5X is undoubtedly the biggest contributor, and the high standards of French cars for body materials and manufacturing processes are the cornerstone of brand rejuvenation. From a long-termist perspective, I believe this persistence will eventually pay off. Just like you may not understand the car for a while, but after a long time of contact, you will always understand what a good car is.
It is understood that the previously rumored business strategy of Dongfeng Citroen will be led by the Chinese side and Dongfeng Peugeot will be led by the French side has been determined. Dongfeng Citroen's marketing department will be relocated back to Wuhan, and Dongfeng Citroen's future products, services and pricing will also be led by the Chinese side, on the basis of absorbing the essence of French technology, from design, pricing, experience, service and other links, closer to the actual needs of Chinese consumers.
The impression of the French car being "stubborn and ungrounded" should become history.
A person's success is measured not by how high he stands, but by how strong his rebound after he falls.
Although it is still difficult to stand in the thirtieth year, we look forward to a complete rebirth of the French car from the inside out. At least, from Dongfeng Citroen to DPLUS, from new products and services, from pragmatic and efficient teams, from the entrepreneurial mentality of living to the death, everyone has seen hope.
As long as you don't want to lie down, others can't let you lie down.
END