Ultimation provides truck tire and wheel assembly machine for 2016 Ford F-650

Ford’s new 2016 F-650 Trucks, now assembled in America, ride on tire and wheel assemblies mounted on an Ultimation truck tire and wheel assembly machine. Located at an all-new facility adjacent to Ford’s Avon Lake, Ohio Assembly plant, mounted and inflated tires and wheels are provided to the assembly plant on a just-in-time sequence. The plant is operated through a partnership between Comprehensive Logistics Inc. and Detroit Chassis LLC.

Ultimation provided it’s two station heavy truck tire and wheel mounting system. The system uses a semi-automatic tire mounting system, with fully automatic inflation. Tires for the new F-650 are mounted and inflated in under 30 seconds each, with an inflation pressure of 105PSI. A truck tire and wheel assembly machine must accept a wide variety of tire and wheel sizes on a single machine, while at the same time offering fast throughput. Operators are able to control various factors in the semi-automatic tire mounting process, enabling fast tire mounting to continue despite variations in tire properties and sizes.

 

 

Operators load wheels onto a feed conveyor using a special overhead crane system. Tires are loaded onto an adjacent conveyor. A vision system then verifies that the correct tire and wheel components have been supplied in the right sequence. At automatic lubrication stations, a soap/lubricant mixture is added to bead area of the tire and the same area of the wheel. The radial orientations of the tire are then adjusted by the operator using a control panel, and the tires and wheels enter the mounting station.