Tuesday, December 7, 2010

BMW cured him!!

This morning we headed off to our scheduled tour of the BMW Plant. Paul was pretty excited, and despite a difficult night of coughing he was bright eyed and bushy tailed this morning. What a fantastic place. Before the tour started we spent time in the customer hall where brand new cars are on display, and on a floor to which we did not have access, private customers were placing their orders!! Alas, not us!! The Plant tour lasted two hours and took us through from where the metal is first pressed to make the panels, to the robots assembling and painting and the humans doing the finishing touches. It was definitely a "no photos" zone, but we were allowed to take them in the customer hall. Part of the entertainment there is a crazy young lad racing a BMW motorbike up and down the staircases!

Marc & Wendy - the chicken farm was battery. They get them in at six weeks old and kill them off at 14 weeks. Not nice. I swear I won't touch chicken for a while!!!

Also Wendy, Marc would be safe with you buying christmas decorations. The majority are what we can buy in Farmers, Ballantynes or The Warehouse - it's just that Made in China is spelt out in many different languages!!! The local German made wooden decorations etc are a real craft, but to us hideously expensive. To the South Africans they are an absolute fortune. But the atmosphere, the lights, the snow and the overall package makes for a truly magical scene.

We'll be on the watch out for Ashton. Thanks for the warning. We look forward to seeing you on Saturday.

Paul here: Some impressive statistics for those who like to be impressed by statistics - there are 9000 plant workers at the Munich plant and 9000 tech staff and that excludes the 600 robots. There are 900 units a day (there are 8 variants on the body shape for the 3 series we saw being made) and all 900 units are made to order - no stock is held.





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3 comments:

  1. WendyDecember 7, 2010 at 9:54 AM

    Paul, the car suits you. No "free" samples to bring back with you ?? The wee dinky "Classic" would suit me...can't believe that BMW made one like this. Look forward to you telling us more. Don't rush home - after 25 deg yesterday it's only 16 deg today and raining.

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  2. Marc and WendyDecember 7, 2010 at 10:08 AM

    I would imagine you will be looking forward to some hot NZ weather when you return. This week looks dismal with 15 degrees predicted for most of the week but, from the weekend on, they expect temperatures to reach 25 again. I guess the change in temperature was responsible for Paul's cold.

    Have you seen many of "the cloaked ones" over there? I wonder if they have thermal or polar fleece Burqa's?

    Take care, have fun.

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  3. AnonymousDecember 8, 2010 at 7:35 AM

    Hi,
    Thanks so much for all the photos. I see it is truely a magical wonderland. The photo's from BMW are great. I'm with Wendy on the dinky blue one.!!! Can imagine myself racing over to the coast in January. Room for Pauline & not much else.!!! If I could afford it, I guess I would just buy stuff as I require it!!
    Missing the phone calls Marie & looking really forward to seeing you both.

    Mary

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