BMW i3 Production - Part 1 (23 minutes)

[uter]

Published on Sep 19, 2013
Watch the BMW i3 being built from start to finish. Part 1: carbon fibre, battery assembly, assembly of the drive module.
Video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gt1k3BLN7pw

 

[SanSerif]

Amazing. Not only am I buying a science fiction powered car, I'm buying a car that's been made by science fiction.

There were barely 10 people in that video; and those were only checking the machines had done their job.

Not surprising that no one has a job anymore if that's how the world is made these days.

 

[TomMoloughney]

Amazing. Not only am I buying a science fiction powered car, I'm buying a car that's been made by science fiction.

There were barely 10 people in that video; and those were only checking the machines had done their job.

Not surprising that no one has a job anymore if that's how the world is made these days.

That's science you see there, not science fiction!

 

[Fencer]

Enjoyed the video thanks for sharing.

 

[Stevei3]

Really great find, thanks !

I marvel at the gentle touch of the robots. I have seen them at work at Audi (Ingolstadt) and Mercedes (Werk 1) but these seem to be twice as sensitive. Power with constraint.

Don't forget to watch the other three episiodes:
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1u7XiBnwPCw
Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htuVoxuMQFQ
Part 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfISmVGCjxg

Steven

 

[uter]

Nice! When I stumbled upon the first one on YouTube, the next episodes hadn't been posted.

It's also fascinating to consider the time it takes to create and program the robots.

 

[Moei3]

Hi to everyone out there
I am a Canadian and I live in Costa Rica. I hope that the i3 will be available here.
This is a small country with short distances between towns and villages so an i3 would suit me just fine.
The local BMW dealer said that we should have it here in a year.
Does anyone know how many are being produced on a weekly basis?

 

[Plug]

Hi. BMW have said that their initial production capacity is 40k units per year.

 

[TomMoloughney]

Hi to everyone out there
I am a Canadian and I live in Costa Rica. I hope that the i3 will be available here.
This is a small country with short distances between towns and villages so an i3 would suit me just fine.
The local BMW dealer said that we should have it here in a year.
Does anyone know how many are being produced on a weekly basis?

The manufacturing process for the i3 is so different from any of their other cars it's a little difficult to gauge how they will be able to ramp up production. BMW has said they will have the capability to make up to 40,000 i3's per year but that certainly isn't right out of the gate. I would guess it will be many months before they would be able to get to that production level and that's if they thought they need that many. I'm not sure they will sell 40k per year. Even 25,000 to 30,000 would be a great goal to reach.

My guess is that for the next 2-3 months production will be slow as they perfect the final assembly line and eliminate any small fit and finish defects they are seeing on the initial cars off the line. They probably won't really ramp up production till November or December sometime.