Modern automotive manufacturing principles, founded on the concepts of lean production and quality management, were initially developed for large-scale mass producers, who until now have been practically the only ones to employ them. With the Lamborghini production system, the company has taken some of the fundamental aspects of those concepts and adapted them to suit small-scale and highly exclusive automobile manufacturing, creating one of the most modern production plants in the world. Here, through a combination of the finest standards of craftsmanship, plant equipment that employs high-precision technologies, and the contribution of its highly qualified and motivated personnel, Lamborghini produces stunning super sports cars.
The Lamborghini Aventador S assembly line moves through 12 different workstations, where specialized teams perform the various assembly operations within production-time cycles of approximately 150 minutes, with a daily production of three cars per day. The construction of the Huracán line, meanwhile, takes place at 22 different stations, with a time of approximately 42 minutes to complete the whole assembly cycle, with daily production of about 11 cars per day.
The engine assembly line produces the engines for the Aventador and derivatives (Sián and Essenza SCV12) and is organized in six workstations, where the completely manual assembly of the power trains is carried out. Daily production currently stands at three V12 engines. Each engine then undergoes 100 minutes of hot functional testing on the engine test bench. After leaving production, the entire vehicle goes to the test bench to perform the commissioning and functional check of its systems in about one hour. Then each car is handed over to a test driver for meticulous testing during an 80-kilometer test drive on the road.
Upholstery Department
In the upholstery department, the seats and interiors of the Aventador and derivatives (Sián and SCV12) are produced according to specific customer requirements. Even the first stages of production require a great deal of experience in the use of upholstery materials, particularly leather. Even though the leathers come from the best manufacturers in Europe, in order to ensure perfect quality, they are once again subjected to meticulous checks for imperfections that would escape the untrained eye. This is one of the most delicate phases of the entire upholstery process. Then the leather and upholstery materials are cut, processed and sewn together. Only in the last phase are the sewn components saddled onto rigid supports to make up the interiors of the cars.
The entire process is carried out manually by experienced operators who are thoroughly trained in the operations of leather processing, stitching and upholstery. The whole upholstery process takes about five days, producing three complete interiors per day.
The Urus Factory: Manifattura Lamborghini
The new Urus brought a substantial expansion of the company’s production site, doubling it from 80,000 to 160,000 square meters.
The new production facility in Sant’Agata Bolognese houses a new assembly line dedicated entirely to Urus, the new finishing department for all Lamborghini models, and the new office building with LEED Platinum certification, the highest standard in the world for energy and environmental certification in building design and construction. A new test track has also been built with thirteen different surfaces specific to SUVs, as well as a new logistics warehouse, a second trigeneration power plant, and the new energy hub for centralized production of all the energy carriers.
The creation of new buildings and the installation of innovative technologies involved more than 600 enterprises working on the project with 3,600 external workers.
The factory expansion was completed in a record time of just 18 months, during which the company operated at full production capacity, also marking the sales record in 2016 (+7% over the previous year).
The project was achieved without neglecting Lamborghini’s commitment to environmental sustainability: the entire production facility in Sant’Agata Bolognese maintains the carbon neutral certification obtained in 2015.
The new assembly line dedicated entirely to the Urus Super SUV is called Manifattura Lamborghini and is characterized by the use of the Industry 4.0 model, which integrates new production technologies to support workers in assembly activities.
The Company expresses this approach as Manifattura Lamborghini, which is characterized by four basic principles:
- Craftsmanship: preserving and optimizing craftsmanship with the integration of innovative technologies, increasing the potential for product customization on one hand, and guaranteeing the highest quality standards on the other.
- Competencies and specialization: digitalization enables workers, via touchscreen devices, to access production information made available by easily consulted interconnected systems.
- Production process: Automatic Guided Vehicles (AGVs) are used as vehicle and material transport systems. Thanks to this system, the flexibility of the building layout is maintained.
- Ergonomics and safety: collaborative robots assist the workers to improve ergonomics and for repetitive operations that require high quality, such as window gluing, under-body screwing, and wheel assembly.
The Urus line has 24 production stations where different teams of specialized workers meet the 35.5 minute assembly cycle time, producing 22.5 cars per day. The use of state-of-the-art systems ensures that even the most complex processes are always carried out with the same level of perfection. The components required for each work step and type of car are made available in the right order on special trolleys. A touchscreen system describes the individual operations to be carried out, displays vehicle-specific information, provides checklists and saves them. The tools, too, are designed to be error-free and provide maximum precision. The electric screwdrivers, for example, only allow tools and specific operations to be used in the predefined order; they are also programmed to deliver the correct torque for each screw and memorize the most important operations. At the heart of the assembly plants is the Lamborghini Lean Laboratory, which is responsible for continuously recording and perfecting the individual operating phases of the Lamborghini production system, as well as for training the employees.