The Zoomlion Smart Industry City, the brand new factory recently build in Changsha, ushered in a historic moment: the two 20-ton and 48-ton medium and large excavators rolled off the assembly every 6 minutes on average thanks to industrial AI
The ceremony
The rollout ceremony of the first mid-sized and large-scale excavators from the Excavating Machinery Park of Zoomlion Smart Industry City was held at the Changsha High-Tech Industrial Development Zone. With the launch of the first product in the excavating machinery park, it has filled the gap in the intelligent manufacturing of large-scale excavators in Hunan Province. Not only this means that the Zoomlion Smart Industry City has entered a completely new stage of “construction and production at the same time”, but also it represents that there will be support for Zoomlion’s excavator sector worth 30 billion yuan.
At the ceremony, which was presided over by Zhou Qingnian, Secretary of the Party Working Committee of the Changsha High-tech Industrial Development Zone, Chen Fei, Vice Governor of Hunan Province, announced the excavator rolled off the assembly line, and Zheng Jianxin, Deputy Secretary of the CPC Changsha Municipal Committee, Mayor of Changsha, and Secretary of the Party Working Committee of Xiangjiang New Area, delivered a speech.
The milestone moment was also witnessed by Cong Peimo, Director of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of Hunan Provincial People’s Government; relevant leaders of the CPC Changsha Municipal Committee, the Changsha Municipal People’s Government, and the Changsha High-tech Industrial Development Zone; Su Zimeng, President of the China Construction Machinery Association; Zhan Chunxin, Chairman and CEO of Zoomlion; the top management team of Zoomlion; customer representatives; and the technicians and workers engaging in the project construction of the Zoomlion Smart Industry City.
According to Zhan Chunxin, fully implementing the concept of “intelligent, digital and green”, the excavator intelligent manufacturing park was planned and designed in accordance with the highest global standards and it houses a smart factory with the highest levels of intelligence, flexibility, and assembly accuracy in the industry as well as an unmanned “Black Light Production Line”, and intelligently manufactures the ultimate products, in an effort to create superior international competitiveness.
It is understood that the two products rolling off the assembly line are 20 ton and 48-ton excavators, both of which are part of Zoomlion’s E-10 series. The 20-ton product model is ZE205E-10, and the vehicle weighs 21.5 tons. It is a mid-sized excavator developed by Zoomlion for earthwork, which features energy conservation, high efficiency, reliability, and more. Another large-scale excavating product is ZE485E-10, a vehicle that weighs 48.5 tons, which is mainly used in mine crushing, loading and transportation, and other working conditions. It is hailed as the “Hero of the Mining World”.
The smart assembly workshop large as five football fields
The production base of the first large excavator rolled off the production line, the smart assembly workshop of large excavator in the park covers an area of 36,000 square meters, equivalent to the size of five standard football fields. It has 13 smart production lines and can produce 13.5-ton to 48-ton excavators.
According to reports, there are more than 100 smart distribution robots configured in the smart assembly workshop of medium and large excavators, which realize the smart distribution of more than 9,000 kinds of parts and is the flexible smart assembly production line with the highest distribution ratio of parts per set in the industry. Taking the automatic track assembly unit as an example, the RGV (Rail Guided Vehicle) realizes automatic track transportation, automatic track installer paves the rolled track and then adjusts the assembly distance between two tracks by automatic distance adjusters. Shuttle vehicle automatically places the nether frame on the tracks, and automatic track installer fix the tracks on the nether frame so that the tracks can be easily installed on the lower frame.
“The production operation used to require three workers, but now only one worker is needed, and the assembly time is shortened by a half. It solves the problems of high labor intensity, low operation efficiency and potential safety hazards caused by frequent use of forklifts and driving operations in the track installation process in the industry, enabling the operation of workers easier and safer,” one on-site technician said.
It is understood that the Excavation Machinery Park will be put into operation in 2021 when the production of Zoomlion excavators will fully realize smart manufacturing from incoming materials to finished products. On-site technicians described the process of smart creation as “the artistic journey of a steel plate”. According to reports, after entering the Excavation Machinery Park, a steel plate is marked with a QR code by laser-like its “ID card”, and then automatically enters the follow-up links of blanking, welding, machining, painting, assembling and commissioning, etc.; thanks to the industry’s top robots’ smart operation, the welding level exceeds the industry average level, and the anti-rust performance of painting is greatly improved, achieving the and 1000-hour neutral salt spray resistance. After painting, the structural parts and hydraulic parts are assembled into an excavator. In the assembly and commissioning process, the industry-leading smarting tightening equipment is adopted; finally, after digital commissioning, the performance of the excavator can be ensured to reach the best state when it is off-line. At this point, a steel plate has become an excavator integrated with Zoomlion’s wisdom and the ultimate creation beauty.
The Excavation Machinery Park is designed by Zoomlion according to the highest standards in the world and fully implements the concept of “intelligence, digitalization, and greening”. It has the smart factory and unmanned dark production line with the highest intelligence, flexibility, and assembly accuracy in the industry, and is an intelligent milestone factory with “perception and thinking”. The land area of the project is about 1,300 mu, where there will be a new material preparation center, an excavator production center, a plate component center, and a commissioning yard.
“Invisible wisdom” is everywhere in the park
The Excavation Machinery Park adopts cutting-edge technologies and concepts such as smart logistics, smart scheduling, industrial AI, digital twin, industrial internet, and big data platform, and organically combines with the intelligent park management and control system, realizing digitalization and transparency of the manufacturing process and laying the foundation for a smart factory.
The application of a series of sophisticated intelligent equipment and technologies has significantly improved the production efficiency of Zoomlion earthmoving machinery, greatly shortened and reduced the R&D cycle, operating cost, and energy consumption per unit output value, and opened a brand new chapter in smart manufacturing of Zoomlion’s earthmoving machinery. It is said that, after the completion of the project, an excavator can be produced every 6 minutes on average, with an annual output of 50,000 excavators and an annual output value of CNY 30 billion. Smart manufacturing and its gathering advantages will provide strong support for the development of Zoomlion earthmoving machinery.
According to industry experts, medium and large excavators have successfully rolled offline in the first-opened area of Zoomlion Smart Industry City, which indicates that Zoomlion’s business of earthmoving machinery has obtained a new driving force for smart manufacturing development, and also marks that Zoomlion has made great milestone progress in insisting on innovation-driven, putting great efforts into intelligent manufacturing and leading industrial upgrading. The produced medium and large excavators filled the gap in the production of large excavators in Hunan Province, enhanced the influence of Hunan enterprises on construction machinery, and promoted the formation of the industrial cluster of construction machinery with more core competitiveness.
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