Promotional videos are meant to convey the company message. For us, we like to share promotional videos when they are conveying a message that we are interested in and/or show something pretty cool. Recently, we came across a promotional video (the one above) from the Cummins’ on the Columbus MidRange Engine Plant. (CMEP as they refer to it as.)

While we haven’t physically been to the plant, it was pretty interesting to find out, that about, half the plant is below ground level and that people park on the roof. We have heard of facilities like this, but none of us have seen one in person.

The video shows many of the different steps in the process of assembling these power plants. All told, there are over 400 individual components that are used to make one 6 cylinder inline engine. At every major step, they are doing quality checks to ensure they are producing the highest quality engines they can. According to Les Jackman, Assembly Quality Inspector, they really focus on “first time right production.” This was re-iterated by Russell Skinner, Plant Quality Leader when he said “continuous improvement is part of our culture.”

In addition to ensuring the parts are assembled right, many of the parts are pulled off the line and physically measured and changed to verify things are being machined properly. They not only hold the normal tolerances that most machine shops hold, there are certain components that are measured down to the 10 micron level (roughly 0.0004 inches).

With that type of tolerance and focus on production, it should not come as a surprise that one of their engines is still going after 2 million miles. Brennan Magee must be a man who lives on the road, but never the less, his truck has gotten him there and back again a number of times.

The video shows many of the different steps along the assembly of the engines. It, also, discusses their culture and how they give back. We had no idea that they actually had a garden where they grew food to donate. This is not only a very kind offer to the community, but it speaks volumes about the type of people that work at the plant.