Brampton Assembly

Brampton Assembly
Built 1985
Location Brampton, Ontario, Canada
Coordinates 43°45′07″N 79°43′05″W / 43.752°N 79.718°W / 43.752; -79.718
Industry Automotive
Products
Employees 3,795 (3,633 hourly, 162 salaried) on two shifts[1]
Area 2,950,000 sq ft (274,000 m2)
Address
  • 2000 Williams Parkway East
  • Brampton, Ontario, Canada

Brampton Assembly is a Chrysler automobile factory located at 2000 Williams Parkway East Brampton, Ontario, Canada. Originally built by American Motors Corporation (AMC) for US$260 million, in what was then called Bramalea, Ontario township, the manufacturing plant was specially designed for building the Eagle Premier.

A previous American Motors facility also known as "Brampton Assembly" was located at Kennedy Road/Steeles Avenue in Brampton. It was built and operated by American Motors and then Chrysler from 1961 to 1992. The plant assembled American Motors and Jeep vehicles until it was closed in 1992, sold off for warehouse use, and later torn down and replaced by commercial/retail development including a Lowe's store.

History

In June 1984, American Motors established an agreement with the governments of Ontario and Canada to build a new assembly plant.[2] Both the national and provincial governments loaned AMC C$100 million each to build the C$764 million facility.[2] The agreement also included a royalty to the governments equal to 1% of the sales price of every vehicle produced at the facility.[2]

The infrastructure builder EllisDon Construction completed the US$260 million (US$599,365,791 in 2016 dollars [3]) plant and associated buildings.[4] The factory was opened by AMC in 1986 as Bramalea Assembly, a state-of-the-art robotics-based assembly facility with 2,950,000 square feet (274,000 m2) of floor space located on 269 acres (108.9 ha) specifically designed to produce the Eagle Premier.

The production line speed was initially about 400 cars per shift (54 jobs per hour) with only one shift scheduled.[5] There were frequent layoffs at this new factory while AMC's old Brampton plant located at Kennedy Road worked steady producing Jeep Wranglers.[5]

This facility was acquired (along with the rest of AMC) by Chrysler in August 1987. The factory was ranked tops in Chrysler's 1988 quality audit of the cars produced in each of automaker's plants.[2]

Production of the Chrysler LH platform cars began in June 1992 and continued with the updated LH cars in 1997. Production switched to the rear-wheel drive Chrysler LX platform cars in January 2004. The retooling for the LX platform was described as a "a low-budget effort" as Chrysler was experiencing some hardship at the time. Robots in the body shop were hand-down from other plants. Its paint shop is said to be the oldest FiatChrysler has in North America.[6]

The attached Brampton Satellite Stamping, which opened in 1991, was built for the launch of the Chrysler LH platform.

At that time, Brampton Assembly operated with three shifts of production. It is the city of Brampton's largest employer, with over 4,200 people working there.

On 19 July 2007, Chrysler Group announced an investment of US$1.2 billion in the Brampton plant for upgrades to the Chrysler 300 series, Dodge Magnum, and Dodge Charger, as well as a $500 million manufacturing investment to prepare for European-market LX platform product loading.[7]

On 16 August 2007, the one-millionth LX rear-wheel-drive vehicle platform rolled-off Brampton Assembly's production line.[8]

On 1 November 2007, Chrysler LLC announced that it was ending the third shift in Brampton with the loss of 1,000 direct jobs as well as declaring that production of the Dodge Magnum in Brampton will end in early 2008.[9]

On 1 May 2009, both the Brampton Assembly and Windsor Assembly plants were shut down as a result of Chrysler's bankruptcy protection filing on 30 April 2009, in the United States, affecting about 2,700 employees at the Brampton Assembly and 4,400 at the Windsor Assembly. A Chrysler parts plant in Etobicoke, Toronto operated until 10 May 2009, when it was closed down for 30 to 60 days, affecting 300 employees, while it went through restructuring under court-ordered creditor protection.[10]

After the reorganization, Chrysler announced the launch of new models of the 300 and Charger to be produced in the Brampton assembly plant, beginning in 2010.[11] The factory began production of the redesigned 2011 Chrysler 300 in January 2011. At this time, total employment was 2,871 (2,733 hourly; 138 salaried) working two shifts.[12]

In 2012, employees at the Chrysler factories in Windsor and Brampton, Ontario ratified the CAW’s labor agreement by an overwhelming majority, without any information from the automaker about plans for new products or investment at either plant.[13] As of December 2012, the Brampton Assembly Plant is the single largest employer in Canada's 11th largest city.[14]

On 19 August 2014, the first Challenger SRT Hellcat (VIN #700001) rolled off the assembly line. It went up for bid at Barrett-Jackson’s Las Vegas auction. When the gavel came down, the Dodge had hit $825,000 US. To the surprise of no one, Rick Hendrick, owner of Hendrick Motorsports bought the 707-hp collectable.[15]

Current products

Eagle Premier
1996 Chrysler Concorde
Dodge Magnum
2007 Dodge SuperBee number 0004 of 1000 and 0427 of 1000
2009 Dodge Challenger

Former products

Annual production

Total production through 2014 = 5,570,648

Notes

  1. ↑ "Fact Sheet: Brampton Assembly Plant and Brampton Satellite Stamping Plant". Chrysler Corporate. January 2013. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Rubenstein, James M. (1992). The changing US auto industry: a geographical analysis. Taylor & Francis. p. 264. ISBN 978-0-415-05544-4. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  3. ↑ Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis Community Development Project. "Consumer Price Index (estimate) 1800–". Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. Retrieved January 2, 2017.
  4. ↑ "Chrysler Corporation Assembly Plant AMC". EllisDon Corporation. Archived from the original on 17 September 2008. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  5. 1 2 "The History of Bramptons Largest Union Local". Canadian Auto Workers Local 1285. 18 May 2008. Archived from the original on 15 April 2014. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  6. ↑ Boudette, Neal. "'Do or die' time as FCA's Brampton plant awaits investment". Autonews. Retrieved 23 December 2015.
  7. ↑ "Chrysler Group to invest $1.2 bln in Brampton assembly plant". Reuters. 19 July 2007. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  8. ↑ "Brampton sets production milestone". Wheels Canada. 16 August 2007. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  9. ↑ "Chrysler Brampton Assembly Plant Job Cuts". The Brampton News. 1 November 2007. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  10. ↑ "Chrysler Canada assembly plants shut down". CBC.ca. 1 May 2009. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  11. ↑ "New Chrysler Business Plan Promising News for Canadian Workers, CAW President says". Canadian Auto Workers. 4 November 2009. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  12. ↑ Fact Sheet: Brampton Assembly Plant and Brampton Satellite Stamping Plant, Chrysler Corporate, January 2011
  13. ↑ Kreindler, Derek (1 October 2012). "CAW Workers Ratify Chrysler Agreement As The Countdown To 2016 Begins". The Truth About Cars. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  14. ↑ "Units". Canadian Auto Workers Local 1285. 14 December 2012. Archived from the original on 16 September 2012. Retrieved 6 November 2014.
  15. ↑ http://autoweek.com/article/car-life/first-challenger-srt-hellcat-sells-825000#ixzz3yf35NmBE
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