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Longtimer · 07-31-2012, 09:52 AM

Found this in an obscure source:

Quote:

GM has begun to change the plant over to build the C7 Corvette. The C7 will be built in the area of the plant where the Cadillac XLR was produced. The plant will have 7.25 miles of new overhead conveyors to move the car frames to various parts of the plant. The plant will be closed the month of
July for extensive interior construction that will allow for production of the C7.

When the plant reopens in August, production will resume on the 2013 Corvettes until January. The plant tours will stop on September 14 th. The reason is they will be working on the C7 and don’t want the public to see it. All of the production line workers will need to be retrained to build the C7. No workers will be doing the same job they are doing now on the C7.

I cannot vouch for this source, or the completeness of his information. However, much of the above ring true to my ears.

FWIW

XQIZT · 07-31-2012, 10:14 AM

From everything else I have heard, that all seems to be reasonable.

Longtimer · 07-31-2012, 10:58 AM

I seriously doubt that the entire C7 will be built exclusively in the old XLR space. The old XLR space was pretty big ... much more than one would think would be needed to produce just the HF Al Rails and frame, but much smaller than the Corvette side of the plant.

If they are adding only the HF rail production, but using up all of the XLR area, they are either significantly changing production methods or freeing up space on the current Corvette side for some future post C6 utilization.

BTW, Google Earth's newest shot is 5/28/11 and looks unchanged going back to their 2004 shot. We know there was some 2011 construction work ...http://www.corvetteblogger.com/2012/...e-c7-corvette/ ...but Google Earth has yet to capture that.

dobrenyr · 11-26-2012, 01:55 PM

Does anyone know when Bowling Green will start production. I'm thinkinig of doing a plant tour to watch the C7 being built.
Hopefully they will be allowing tours by May...

elegant · 11-26-2012, 07:06 PM

GM has stated the plant will be closed to public tours "until further information."

JThomas · 12-01-2012, 08:12 AM

It probably won't be until the Fall of 2013, before the plant is back open to the public. Production of 2014 Corvettes will probably start around May/June 2013.

spd98 · 12-03-2012, 11:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JThomas

It probably won't be until the Fall of 2013, before the plant is back open to the public. Production of 2014 Corvettes will probably start around May/June 2013.

I suspect regular production may start early with the current time line. I would guess maybe late April or early May are possible. Putting the cars on the road by mid summer.

The question is when will the tours actually start again? I'm sure it will be a while after production starts and the first couple of groups have cleared QC. I doubt GM wants another Camaro debacle, so I would expect them to take it slow at first.

I would think that we should start seeing some on the road shots around the plant after the first of the year from test builds though. I would think CTF cars should be on the horizon already.

Longtimer · 12-03-2012, 12:48 PM

The official release of C7 is on 1/13/13. The only reason not to resume BG tours after that, would be if they are still fitting out the the plant or if there is still line training to perform.

Seems to me, as soon as those two requirements are completed, and they are building final production models, the tours could start. JMHO