Day 13: Cars and a Shinkansen

Monday March 7th, 2011 by Perry van Schaijk

Before going to Toyota everybody ate the breakfast they bought yesterday. This time, we traveled by chartered bus. As we would be going to Kyoto in the afternoon and would not come back to the hotel anymore, everybody had to bring their belongings. With some difficulty we finally managed to fit everything into the bus.

Toyota showed us how they make cars in their factory. The Toyota assembly line is constantly moving, transporting multiple types of cars. Workers and cars stand on the same conveyor belt and so do the tools they use. Every worker has a specific task to complete before the car gets to the next station. Toyota implemented many features to enlarge the throughput of the belt. For example, all boxes containing parts have a light on them. When the light is green, the part is needed in this step and when it is blue it is needed but the worker already picked it up. Another part of the factory housed a practice area where you could test your skills at assembling a car. Most of us tried to do some of these “games” but they proved to be far more difficult than they looked. At the end of the tour we had the opportunity to take a look at the welding shop where we got an impressive view of numerous, simultaneously moving robot arms.

The next item on the agenda was the Toyota museum. At the entrance were two robots, one could actually play the trumpet with his “mouth”. The other robot demonstrated Toyota’s vision on future transportation. Toyota’s vision is that everybody should have his or her own transportation device which can be used in cities and on highways. The rest of the museum showed new technologies of Toyota, including fuel cells, but also showed the history of the company. The end of the tour presented the latest car models Toyota produces.

After Toyota, we moved on to Kyoto. Unfortunately, we had to take a minor detour as a participant had left his suit in the hotel. After riding the Shinkansen once again, the muscles of the participants were tested one last time before entering the hotel as it took many stairs to get to and from the subway in Kyoto. Checking in went smoothly and now everyone is enjoying their free time in a city full of cultural beauty.