Liugong's Indian Production Facility Inaugurated

New greenfield production facility would add value to its equipment sales in India in the long–term. As it proposes to undertake production of assorted range of construction equipment under Liugong brand in tandem with production of wheel loaders. Partha Pratim Basistha reports after taking a round of the plant.

Liugong's mega greenfield facility at Pithampur in Madhya Pradesh owes its importance as it would go on significantly to support the state owned Chinese equipment major's ambitious growth plans for Indian construction and mining market. The company aims to be the third largest wheel loader manufacturer in India in near future, said Mr. Zeng Guangan, Vice Chairman & President, Liugong.

Well Integrated Production Facility

Spread on a total area of 1,77,000 square metres (44 acres), the-state-of-the-art facility has been planned in three phases. The newly inaugurated phase-1 of the plant, constructed at a cost of Rs 140 crores would undertake manufacturing of wheel loaders across all the models.

According to Mr.Sunil Sapru, Director Sales & Marketing, "the production unit at Pithampur has been planned to create economies of scale during the course of production. This is so as to avoid delay in production lead times in turn keeping cost of production well checked." Elaborately, as per the production plan, the main fabrication shop is equipped with plasma cutting machines. It is also equipped with rotating welding machines supported with fixtures and computerised bending machines. The fabrication shop, meant for production of wheel- loaders has been equipped with different set of fixtures for booms, arms, rear chassis, tanks, buckets etc, supported by individual welding machines. As per Mr. Sapru, production arrangement through placement of welding and fixtures have been made in the fabrication shop as appropriate fabrication is critical for optimum functioning of the machine in harsh working conditions."

The main fabrication shop also houses the shot blasting and paint shop. Under the main fabrication shop, separated by a partition, is the assembly shop which comprises the assembly line, has separate fitment areas for individual set of components to the equipment as it moves from one line of assembly to another.

The mother warehouse is one of the significant supporting arms of the new facility as it would support the assembly line and concurrently meet the components requirements of the dealers. The company has an existing warehouse at Chennai.

Liugong plans to construct additional new two phases of the plant within the existing area involving an investment of Rs. 500 crores by 2012. Post commissioning of the proposed additional phases, the company will annually produce 2,000 units of wheel loaders, excavators, pavers, backhoe loaders, road rollers, motor graders, and other equipment. Initially, the phase–1 plant would produce 50 loaders per annum. However, the plant has the capacity to produce 3000 loaders annually.