Learn more about HORSE:
https://www.horse.cars/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/horsepowertrain/
In this video I do something that I have never done before and that is to go inside an actual engine factory. And this is not just any engine factory, it's a super modern engine factory that manufactures 1 million engines per year, or 1 engine every 11 seconds.
The factory belongs to HORSE. Who is Horse? Well, they stated off as a sub-division of the French car giant Renault, but currently they're a joint venture between Renault and Geely from China. Renault and Geely each own 45% of the company while Aramco from Saudi Arabia owns the remaining 10%.
The video covers the entire process of an engine taking birth, from the very raw materials right down to a completely finished, dyno tested engine ready to be installed in a car. This is possible because HORSE's Valladolid factory is essentially an engine manufacturing one-stop shop. It's more like a small city but you get the point. The process starts at the foundry where they do pressure casting and pre-machining of the engine blocks. Here we will see how HORSE reduces their costs by 3D printing replacement parts for their manufacturing machines and we will see engine block pressure casting as well as die maintenance using 3D scanning.
After that we go into the machining section of the factory. Here we will have the opportunity to see the revolutionary bore spray coating process. This a process where melted steel is sprayed right onto an aluminum engine block which is then later machined and fine honed. The result is that we create micro-pores in the cylinder where the oil can stick and allow lubrication together with reduced friction leading to improved economy and emissions as well as a reduced engine block weight. This is pretty amazing because the cross-hatching of the cylinders most of us are familiar with is no longer present nor necessary inside the engine. In the machining plant we will also see the honing process as well as numerous machines in charge of control and cleanliness. What's especially impressive for me is a 500 bar water jet machine that can remove bore spray coating steel residue without harming the aluminum engine block itself. What's also really fun to see is that each engine is tracked with an RFID tag that contains the data matrix of every engine which is also uploaded into a cloud to allow a big data analysis and monitoring of the entire manufacturing process.
After the machining process is completed we proceed into the last phase which is the assembly process. The assembly plant is a miracle of modern planning and logistics. Here we will see AGVs or automated ground vehicles ensuring timely distribution of engine parts. We will also see how the engines are tested again and again for leaks in the high pressure oil, low pressure oil and water systems. The final leak test involves helium being injected into the engines and then a specialized sniffer robot checks the presence of helium molecules around the engines to detect any leakage. We get to see an axial play check, gasket material application, main bearing plate cross-bolting sequence, rod bearing installation, piston and rod assembly installation as well as optical checking of the piston and rod assembly. One of my favorite parts was a robot hand that holds a tissue and wipes the timing chain cover mating surface. It then throws the tissue into the garbage can.
The assembly process is finished off with both a cold-dyno and a traditional dyno where the engine gets started and verified for the first time to see if it's running right. On the cold dyno the engine has fluids but it doesn't get fuel and it's spun by an electric motor to reach target rpm where outputs from various engine sensors are checked. On the hot dyno the engine is connected to a system of fluid and fuel supply along with all the sensors and is ran at 500 rpm increments up to 3500 rpm.
A special thank you to my patrons:
Daniel
Zwoa Meda Beda
valqk
Toma Marini
Cole Philips
Allan Mackay
RePeteAndMe
Sam Lutfi
Cakeskull
#d4a #enginefactory #horsepower
00:00 Entry prep
02:48 Casting
07:03 Bore Spray Coating
11:37 Cleaning and Machining
14:24 Assembly
21:36 Engine Start and Testing