Company:

An industry-leading manufacturer of heavy-duty transit vehicles

Objective:

Achieve considerable cost savings by converting the cover material for the bus engine management computer from fiberglass to thermoformed plastic

Situation:

Incorrectly designed tooling produced by another supplier had stalled the vacuum forming production process for more than one year.

Solution:

Instead of discarding the existing mold, General Plastics was able to cost-effectively modify the tooling to function as it was originally intended. A new material was then utilized to manufacture the covers in several different custom colors.

An extensive financial analysis, required by the customer’s union representatives, demonstrated the significant savings that would be achieved as a result of transferring all secondary operations, including the complete supply chain management, quality control and value-added assembly of 60 components, to General Plastics. This process also enabled the customer to satisfy challenging NAFTA requirements.

Bottom Line:

Within eight weeks of the initial request, finished units, ready for installation, were shipped to the company’s manufacturing facility. Transitioning from fiberglass to plastic yielded an impressive 40% reduction in material costs and expedited production output. The turnkey integration of all manufacturing processes also created a notable decrease in shipping and labor expenses.