Motoring Middle East: Car news, Reviews and Buying guides

Do it right or the consequences could be dire, plus we get to drive virgins!

By Shahzad Sheikh

Imagine if you had to pass a test to do your job, not once a year or each month, but Every Single Day! I would be redundant for half the year – and that’s not even counting my ‘off’ days.

We’re not talking easy multiple choice here – it would be extremely subtle stuff. Just thinking about how that might effect my usually mediocre grammar if it was put into affect, has me nauseous.

Indeed my complete mix-up of the words ‘effect’ and ‘affect’ and misuse of ‘nauseous’ in the previous paragraph suggests that just the thought of it has already got me stressed out.

But that is exactly what happens to the workers on the final inspection line at Toyota’s sprawling Kyushu plant in Fukuoka, where they build the Lexus RX, ES and IS convertible models.

These are the guys that should be able to feel even a point-one millimetre discrepancy in a panel gap just by running their fingers along it. They have to prove their ability each morning – fail and they don’t do that job that day.

Fail consistently and they have to commit Seppuku in front the entire 6000-strong staff of the massive plant (it stretches over two kilometres) out of shame and humiliation.

Okay, I made that last bit up, but the rest is true and it demonstrates the almost brutal and unwavering attention to detail that is prevalent throughout the prestigious facility which opened in 1991, and became a Lexus facility in 1997.

Of the three Lexus plants (two in Japan and one in Canada) this one alone churns about 1700 cars a day over two shifts running from 6am till midnight, and if they really turn the wick up, they can manage up to 2000. Each takes 40 hours from metal stamping to final inspection.

So does production differ, if at all, from Toyotas when putting together Lexus cars? It’s all in the details, things like taking longer over production processes, more stringent tolerances in quality, more layers of body-finishing (up to seven in some cases), hand painting interiors, the more intricate and precise final inspections as already mentioned, and finally the test drives.

There’s a short 2.5km course including two banked corners and four rough road surfaces. Whilst only 5% of Toyota models will undergo this drive, every single Lexus runs on one of the two similar circuits.

And the best bit? They let us journos loose in actual customer cars on the course! So if you’re getting a white RX or a grey ES anytime soon, there’s a tiny chance that I’ve already been behind the wheel of it!

Don’t be too alarmed. This is Japan and the protocols were meticulous. We had to remove any potentially sharp objects about our person, couldn’t wear jeans, and even had to cover our our belt buckles before we were allowed near the cars.

Then of course we were chaperoned. But that’s okay, this wasn’t a chance to thrash the cars and see what they would do after all – despite the fact that the you could get up to 120kph plus on the straight and the banked corners were to be taken at 60kph and 40kph without braking.

But the idea of this testing is just to check that everything works okay and there are no unusual sounds or vibrations, even when you’re bouncing along split corrugated surfaces at 50kph and having your joints snapped on a rugged cobble stone road.

Frankly speaking it was a privilege to be allowed to drive a ‘virgin’ car that has just rolled off the assembly line.

Still car factories aren’t all that different and every manufacturer will make elaborate claims about procedure and quality control.

It has to be said that the twin-edicts at Kyushu of clean and silent were very much in evidence – it just doesn’t seem a place where they’re frantically churning out that many cars. All activity has controlled, measured and very calmly carried out.

And the lush green surroundings in the breathtaking hills around Fukuoka city aided that impression. The only thing that I wasn’t able to discern, however, was at which part of the process the actual soul was inserted into the cars!