GM Announces $890 Million in Plant Upgrades

On Tuesday, GM announced that it is investing about $890 million to upgrade five North American factories as part of its fuel-efficient small-block engine program. The investments include facility renovations and installation of new, highly flexible engine machining and assembly equipment and special tooling for manufacturing efficiency and engine quality.

The investment includes $400 million for its Tonawanda, NY plant; $235 million for the facility in St. Catharines, Ontario; $115 million for Defiance, Ohio; $111 million for the Bedford, Indiana plant; and $32 million for its Bay City, Michigan plant. In addition to the monetary investment, the announcement consists of plans to create or retain more than 1,600 jobs in the five factories. Many of the newer positions will be filled by laid off GM employees.

The AP reports that GM has chosen the Tonawanda Engine plant to build a new V8 engine. This is the second big investment in the Tonawanda plant announced this year. In February, GM announced the western New York facility would receive $425 million in upgrades to begin building a new version of the four-cylinder Ecotec engine in 2012.

GM, the largest US automaker, is boosting its spending on more fuel-efficient engines as governments push for reduced pollutants and as rising fuel prices drive consumer demand for vehicles with better fuel mileage. Since emerging from bankruptcy in July, GM has invested $1.5 billion at 20 US and Canadian facilities and restored or created 7,500 jobs.

“GM is investing in our plants, restoring and creating jobs and making progress toward our vision of designing, building, and selling the world’s best vehicles,” said Mark Reuss, president of GM North America.

Read GM's press release

AP article in Chicago Tribune

The Future of Space Exploration

President Obama outlined his strategy for NASA on April 15 at the Kennedy Space Center. While he proposes to spend an additional $6 billion over the next five years, he has also discontinued the Constellation Program, which was meant to send astronauts back to the moon by 2020, noting the program was less important, over budget, and behind schedule.

So what will the additional funds be spent on? The President sees us going deeper into space, and staying there longer. He said this new plan will actually send more astronauts into space over the next ten years than previously planned. He even expects us to be orbiting Mars by the mid-2030s with a landing on the red planet not much farther into the future.

With the Constellation Program being cancelled, and the space shuttle fleet being retired at the end of 2010, the only way that Americans will be able to get into space is aboard the Russian Soyuz capsules. Commercial vehicles are an option, but it will be years before they are ready.

Some famous astronauts expressed their concerns about this new proposal. They wrote a letter saying “the USA is far too likely to be on a long downhill slide to mediocrity,” and that the cancellation of the Constellation Program is “devastating”.

Created in 1958, NASA is an important part of American history as well as its future. NASA’s vision is “To understand and protect our home planet, to explore the Universe and search for life, and to inspire the next generation of explorers...as only NASA can.” Whatever your opinions are on the changes, it’s sure to be an exciting ride as we continue to learn more about the Universe, and it turn, learn even more about ourselves.

3D Laser Scanning for Marine Applications

In recent years laser scanning technology has developed into an adopted method of documenting as-built conditions. More commonly, 3D laser scanning is seen as a required practice for industries such as architecture, civil engineering and construction. Managing a building’s lifecycle through the entire process by the use of 3-dimensional data has changed the way projects are designed and delivered.

However, with the increased accuracy and longer range of laser scanners come new applications. GKS Global Services, an international provider of scanning services has pioneered laser scanning techniques. One of these techniques has been using 3D laser scanning for marine applications and ship building.

Much of the vessels that you see today do not have digital documentation or CAD models. Even though they are designed using 3D data, vessels are still assembled with minor errors or discrepancies. GKS now provides laser scanning for large vessels that either need to be refurbished or need to be assembled for the first time. Using the FARO Laser Scanner Photon, GKS is able to scan up to 120m or 395ft. With a high degree of accuracy and a resolution of up to 711 million pixels per scan, the data collected to enough to show where piping, frames and hulls may align or be offline. Marine engineers are discovering that laser scanning can provide them dependable CAD models that can be used to design and retro-fit older vessels as they age in years.

To read the full article on how GKS conducts laser scanning for marine applications, click HERE.

BAE Systems Named World’s Biggest Arms Maker

The New York Times reported that BAE Systems has “topped the list as the world’s biggest armaments company.” The company has “sharply expanded its sales of armored vehicles for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan,” according to a report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). The report said that BAE moved up two spots in 2008 with military sales of $32.4 billion, surpassing rivals Lockheed Martin, Northrup Grumman, Boeing, and General Dynamics.

Based in the UK, BAE is the first non-US company to hold this spot. Despite not being a US company, BAE does more than half its business in the US. In fact, North American companies dominate the list with 60-percent of the arm sales of the top 100 companies. It’s noted that Chinese firms were absent from the list despite the Institute ranking China’s military spending as second only to the US. It is explained that Chinese firms would rank higher, but there is inadequate or unreliable information.

Global news source AFP reported that BAE had arm sales of 20.98 billion pounds ($32.4 billion) compared to Lockheed Martin’s 19.36 (29.9) and Boeing’s 18.9 (29.1). SIPRI arms-industry expert Susan Jackson noted, “BAE really shows the increasing internationalization of the arms industry and the attractiveness of the US market.”

It is also very interesting to note that BAE’s sales were greater than the gross domestic product of 105 countries (according to SIPRI). Along those same lines, the total sales of the 100 largest defense groups had arms sales of 249 billion pounds ($384 billion). That figure is more than three times the size of the total development aid of OECD (Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development) countries, which was only 77.73 billion pounds, or $120 billion.

Read the full article in the New York Times

BAE Systems

Turbine Upgrade using Portable Measurement Technology

During a turbine upgrade project at Rocky Mountain Hydro Electric Plant, Oglethorpe Power Corporation was tasked with finding ways to trim the schedule. The plant is a pumped storage facility located in the Appalachian mountains of Northwest Georgia, approximately 62 miles from Chattanooga, Tennessee. Oglethorpe is the nation’s largest power supply cooperative which provides electricity to 4.1 million Georgia citizens.

A Senior Engineer at Oglethorpe had been looking at a system that was gaining notoriety in the metrology industry for attaining measurements with phenomenal precision using laser technology. This instrument – a laser tracker – can be used to perform critical measurements for “as found” and “as left” conditions pertaining to disassembly and reassembly of their pumped storage turbine generator.

The laser tracker was used in several aspects of this project including alignment and reverse engineering. Click here to read the full story.