Toyota To Make Major Announcement About SA Plant

[DannyT]

http://www.woai.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=c83c0a3e-6d43-4208-a615-cb4e8dae551c

Sad News for those who work there...


News 4 has learned a major announcement is expected to be made Thursday morning concerning the future of San Antonio's Toyota Tundra plant.

The announcement is expected to come from Toyota's corporate executives. A good source here tells News 4 that Toyota is expected to suspend production here in San Antonio on a temporary basis.

A second major announcement, according to the source, is that Toyota is expected to consolidate all Tundra operations into San Antonio in the next year. News 4 is told that would be very good news for the city in the long term. There are currently two plants that build Tundra trucks. The one on the south side and one in Princeton, Indiana.

You may remember News 4 took you to that plant in Indiana back in 2006. We showed you the assembly lines and the new Tundra trucks being built there. A spokeswoman for the plant in Indiana tells our sister station there that the announcement should not result in any layoffs at that plant, but they do make other Toyota vehicles there.

There are roughly 2,000 people who work at the Toyota plant on San Antonio's south side and roughly 2,100 people work for Toyota suppliers here.

Keep it here on News 4 for the very latest on this developing story. We'll have new information Thursday on News 4 at 5, 6 and 10pm.

[sUPER sOAKER]

go to college...get a job using your brains...not hands.

[DannyT]

thats why some people work these jobs so their kids can have that opportunity....

[Smackie Chan]

Buddy Holly?.............................Bueller?


leave it to that salad tossing homo to bail on our city!

[T Park]

Sounds like semi good news.

[Twisted_Dawg]

I am not sure when Toyota, GM, Ford & Dodge will wake up and realize the age of the mass produced big pick up truck is over. Gasoline will never decline back down to the levels that will allow purchasrs to come back. Nissan alread announced plans to stop making that big Titan PU.

Toyota should just retool the SA plant and make some new generation smaller cars that get 50+ mph...because that is what will be in demand in 2 years when gas is $6 per gallon.

[gameFACE]

Yeah, no shit. Super Size Me Tundras and Suburbans should go out the door. I hope this plant has the opportunity to become a place where a new type of vehicle is produced.

I guess the main workers are safe which is good.

[Johnny_Blaze_47]

Word is the local plant will keep producing Tundras, the Indiana plant will switch from Tundra to Highlanders and another plant in the South will become a Prius plant.

EDIT: Source. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25621408/

---

Toyota reveals U.S. manufacturing changes
Automaker to start producing hybrid Prius in the U.S. for first time
The Associated Press
updated 8:34 a.m. CT, Thurs., July. 10, 2008

DETROIT - Toyota Motor Corp. is adjusting its U.S. manufacturing operations to meet customer demands for smaller, more fuel-efficient vehicles.

The Japanese automaker said Thursday it will start producing the hybrid Prius in the U.S. for the first time at a plant it is building in Blue Springs, Miss. Production will begin in 2010.

The company also says it will suspend production of the Toyota Tundra at its San Antonio truck plant for three months starting Aug. 8 because of declining demand.

Toyota plans to stop producing the Tundra at a plant in Princeton, Ind., this spring. That plant now will make the Highlander SUV.

Toyota says workers who build its trucks in San Antonio will stay on the job through the shutdown.

[CubanMustGo]

According to a story I read in the DMN (paper copy, sorry no link), the SA plant workers will not be out of work during the three month shutdown, rather they will be engaged in kaizen (continuous improvement) exercises. One more example of how Japanese auto manufacturers are different than US ones, who would just tell their workers "sorry, we'll see you when we reopen."

Too bad they couldn't build the Prius in SA but with the plant having just been built for Tundra manufacturing it would have been hard. Maybe they will start taking the Prius technology (or next gen tech) and implementing it in the Tundra. When you can go from 16 to 24 mpg, that's a huge impact on the amount of gas you use.

[CubanMustGo]

go to college...get a job using your brains...not hands.

When are you going to start using yours?

[Thunder Dan]

send that shit back to Japan!

[BacktoBasics]

go to college...get a job using your brains...not hands.There is typically always work for blue collar guys....might not always pay top dollar but as the times get tough more desk jobs are lost than labor jobs.

Pretty dumb comment.

[CosmicCowboy]

I am not sure when Toyota, GM, Ford & Dodge will wake up and realize the age of the mass produced big pick up truck is over. Gasoline will never decline back down to the levels that will allow purchasrs to come back. Nissan alread announced plans to stop making that big Titan PU.

Toyota should just retool the SA plant and make some new generation smaller cars that get 50+ mph...because that is what will be in demand in 2 years when gas is $6 per gallon.

It's not over...there will always be a need for big trucks...you sure can't put a welding machine and 3000# of tools or tow a 10,000# trailer with a damn Prius...it will just eliminate the urban cowboys from the mix...They ruined the market and drove up the prices for serious truck users anyway...

[Thunder Dan]

go to college...get a job using your brains...not hands.

without the Blue Collar there is no white collar- true story, that is why you see rich guys wearing these shirts to remind them of that

http://capitalist.blog.is/users/82/capitalist/img/c_documents_and_settings_alan_desktop_gordon-gekko.jpg

[BigZak]

the guy was working on a camry hybrid system, but the tundra engineer's can't be too far away from a self inflicted blade to the gut either...



http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,378961,00.html



TOKYO — A Japanese labor office ruled that one of Toyota's top car engineers died from working too many hours.

It was the latest decision against overwork in Japan, where stoic acceptance of extended overtime has long been the norm.

The victim's wife's lawyer says the man, who was 45, had been under severe pressure as the lead engineer in developing a hybrid version of Toyota's Camry line.

According to the lawyer, in the two months up to his death, the engineer averaged more than 80 hours of overtime per month.

The ruling, which will allow his family to collect benefits from his work insurance, is the most recent in a string of decisions against long working hours in Japan. The country has been struggling to cut down on deaths from overworking, known as "karoshi," which have steadily increased since the Health Ministry first recognized the phenomenon in 1987.

[BacktoBasics]

It's not over...there will always be a need for big trucks...you sure can't put a welding machine and 3000# of tools or tow a 10,000# trailer with a damn Prius...it will just eliminate the urban cowboys from the mix...They ruined the market and drove up the prices for serious truck users anyway...I agree.

Gas if it does hit 6 or 7 bucks won't stay there forever. The actual real world demand for the US isn't even close to the 4 or 5 hundred percent increase in the cost of gas. Something will give.

Not to mention most of these newer trucks are getting 20mpg hwy and 16city. If they stretch that up to 26 and 22 or better people will still be on board.

[Thunder Dan]

Chevy has a Hybrid Silverado- and one of the benefits of this truck is you don't support a country that killed almost 2,400 Americans!

[MoSpur]

So they're gonna shut down for three months and then open up again.

[Taco]

http://www.lovefilm.com/lovefilm/images/products/1/15381-large.jpg

[CosmicCowboy]

So they're gonna shut down for three months and then open up again.

I heard 7 months on the radio this morning...

[Vinnie_Johnson]

Why don't they mod the plant and start cranking out more of their Prius that would help they only have a seven month wait list.

[Johnny_Blaze_47]

Why don't they mod the plant and start cranking out more of their Prius that would help they only have a seven month wait list.

There's a ton of Tundra overstock right now and it makes sense that once it sells down, you keep making Tundras closer to where more buyers live. They're going to convert the Mississippi plant to build the Prius, and apparently, it's the first plant in the States that will build that vehicle.

[Anti.Hero]

Titan Killed.

Tundra Dying.

Silverado 4 lyfe.



Toyota had plans for a 3/4 ton diesel around 09 also. Duramax ownz joo

[Vinnie_Johnson]

There's a ton of Tundra overstock right now and it makes sense that once it sells down, you keep making Tundras closer to where more buyers live. They're going to convert the Mississippi plant to build the Prius, and apparently, it's the first plant in the States that will build that vehicle.

Good info kind of shocking that they were not building the Prius here. I am pretty sure it's there number one seller at this point.

[RandomGuy]

http://www.darithdeng.com/?p=1603


Toyota to retool new US plant for hybrid cars
July 10, 2008 |

Japanese auto giant, Toyota Motor, says it will dedicate
a US plant under construction to the production of fuel-efficient hybrid vehicles amid surging gasoline prices.

Toyota at first planned to produce sports utility vehicles at the plant in a southern state of Mississippi when it goes into operation in 2010.

This is in Mississippi, but it does show that Toyota is shifting production to more fuel efficient models.

Texas, with its large number of working ranches and farms has seen little drop off in the number of big-ass trucks sold. Making it highly likely that truck plants in the state would close down, and just as likely that if Toyota intends to consolidate large vehicle production, it would do so in Texas.


Toyota Tundra sales outgrowing Ford, GM in Texas truck market
(http://www.bloggingstocks.com/2008/01/16/toyota-tundra-sales-outgrowing-ford-gm-in-texas-truck-market/)

Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) has moved into Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) sandbox and has started smashing Ford's mighty sandcastles. That's right -- Toyota trucks, notably the Tundra full-size pickup, are taking market share left and right in the state of all truck states, Texas.

Domestically, one in seven large trucks is sold in the state of Texas, and while truck sales from General Motors Corp. (NYSE: GM), Ford and Cerberus-owned Chrysler have declined 5% recently, Toyota's large truck sales have increased 79%. This is due in no small part to Toyota's aggressive incentive spending that really makes the Tundra look like a much-less-expensive but just as powerful option to competitor trucks.

Anybody who thinks the plant in SA is going away has a few more thinks to do.

If anything, I would bet the major announcement is an exapansion of some sort, based on the above article.

[RandomGuy]

Toyota overall has posted strong US market share gains, and with a solid line up of fuel-efficient smaller cars, is a step ahead of US automakers in capacity.

They are moving production capacity to the US to cut transportation/import costs and become more competitive.

Toyota is, in essence, almost becoming the fourth major car US manufacturer, and less of a foreign import.

[Mark in Austin]

Toyota's Hybrid system doesn't work on heavy vehicles - one reason the Tahoe hybrid system has been touted so much by GM. What I don't understand at all is why Toyota doesn't make a hybrid version of the RAV4. It's lighter and smaller than the Highlander - the hybrid fuel efficiency numbers would be outstanding.

[Vinnie_Johnson]

Toyota's Hybrid system doesn't work on heavy vehicles - one reason the Tahoe hybrid system has been touted so much by GM. What I don't understand at all is why Toyota doesn't make a hybrid version of the RAV4. It's lighter and smaller than the Highlander - the hybrid fuel efficiency numbers would be outstanding.

I have a friend who is GM of a large Toyota dealer here, and he was recently running through a list of upcoming models for release in Australia soon in converation with me.
A hybrid RAV4 was one of those upcoming models.

[CubanMustGo]

Toyota's Hybrid system doesn't work on heavy vehicles - one reason the Tahoe hybrid system has been touted so much by GM. What I don't understand at all is why Toyota doesn't make a hybrid version of the RAV4. It's lighter and smaller than the Highlander - the hybrid fuel efficiency numbers would be outstanding.

Toyota's next gen hybrid system will probably be more effective in such applications. That the nice thing about the technology finally being out there in decent numbers - both they and Honda are making improvements every few years that significantly enhance mileage and breadth of application.

[Oh, Gee!!]

go to college...get a job using your brains...not hands.

or you'll end up stuck in iraq

[Ginofan]

Toyota's Hybrid system doesn't work on heavy vehicles - one reason the Tahoe hybrid system has been touted so much by GM. What I don't understand at all is why Toyota doesn't make a hybrid version of the RAV4. It's lighter and smaller than the Highlander - the hybrid fuel efficiency numbers would be outstanding.

We just bought an 08 Rav4 a couple of months ago...and I'm getting about 23 mpg, which isn't horrible at all for a "mini suv". How much do you think they could get out of it the Rav 4 went Hybrid?