Issue 5 /May 2018

The car is stillaliveWhen we believe the daily lament, theend of the car as we have known it isimminent. We are told that the car is notonly responsible for all the traffic jams,air pollution and thus also for damagingour health. It is considered a means oftransport of the past. Future researchersforesee that soon, we will all be usingpublic transport and driverless buses orcannonballing around at hyper speed insubterranean tubes.

In this situation, people like us who livein the automotive industry and work forit day by day have to be very self-confi-dent. What gives us at TÜNKERScourage is the fact that people are notan anonymous mass but a group of indi-viduals who have to go to work everyday, then go to the municipal office,have an appointment with a doctor atlunchtime or start off for a trip to the seain the early afternoon. All this makes theindividual car so attractive and irreplace-able.

It is certain that metropolitan areasrequire integrated mobility concepts.But we are convinced that the individualvehicle will survive, maybe in a differentshape. The car remains a product with afuture and the automotive market has afuture, too. We at TÜNKERS like to workfor this market and develop innovationsday by day for its automated produc-tion.

Best regards

Olaf Tünkers

The German physicist and systemsdeveloper for electrical drive trains,Richard Randoll, thinks that “we will allbe buying electric cars in 2026”. Hisassumption is based on the speed ofprogress. According to Randoll, thetransition to a new technology takesas much time as the lifetime of the oldproduct. His thesis is backed by pastdevelopments from the wooden sailingboat to the steam boat, 1889-1909,mean lifetime of a sailboat 20 years;analog camera to digital camera,1995-2005, mean lifetime of a camera:10 years; as well as mobile phone tosmartphone, 2007-2011, mean lifetimeof a mobile phone: 4 years. Accordingto this reasoning, the transition fromthe combustion engine to the electriccar will take from 2011 to 2026 as themean lifetime of a passenger car is 15years.

Electric cars worldwide in 2026

Data source: Zentrum für Sonnenenergie und Wasserstoffforschung (ZSW) BaWüDipl.-Phys. Richard Randoll

The number of electric cars doubles every 15 months

Before the end of the year, the US-based company Samson Motors willlaunch the flying car called“Switchblade”. The two-seater withfold-out wings will be available for US$120,000 (about €100,000). Driven by a190 PS four-cylinder engine, it willreach a top speed of 160 km/h on theroad and 320 km/h in the air.

Flying car to be introduced as early as 2018

Today’s cars are not conceivablewithout operating systems. And themajor automotive manufacturers arecurrently developing systems that donot have to be operated anymorebecause they know the driver so wellthat they are able to react to him auto-matically.

However, until this technology isready for the market, the Japanesemanufacturer Norihide Umeyama puts“Kirobo” next to Toyota drivers. Thepuppet-size robot entertains the driverand is rather a companion than anassistant. In the next developmentstage, Kirobo will be linked to the vehi-cle and thus be able to intervene intooperation.

“Kirobo”assists drivers

Kirobo

The Switchblade Samson Motorworks

Are electric cars more climatefriendly than diesel cars – even if youlook at the entire production process?A study from the University ofBrussels commissioned by theAssociation of Transport andEnvironment has shown that theanswer is: Yes! With a total of 129gCO2/km, the electric car is about 37%below the diesel engine – not only

when it is manufactured in Germany,but even in countries that use mainlybrown coal for power generation. Thedifference is also obvious when welook into details. While only 13gCO2/km are emitted for the produc-tion of the batteries, the diesel has afootprint of 27g CO2/km. You see: theelectric car keeps its promise.

EXPERT-TÜNKERS has invested ina processing centre AXA VPC 2800Uin order to expand production andprocessing capacities. The new centremakes it possible to produce rotarytables with diameters of 3 m and liftingcolumns with lengths up to ca. 4 m.

The machine itself has a weight of52 t and is based on a foundation ofmore than 100 t of reinforced concretewith a ceiling thickness of ca. 1,600mm.

In spite of the size, tolerances of0.01 mm can be guaranteed.

The new AXA VPC 2800U wasdelivered in late January 2018 and iscurrently being commissioned. State-of-the-art production of our largerotary tables will start after an inten-sive training of EXPERT-TÜNKERSstaff.

EXPERT-TÜNKERS invests intonew processing centre

AXA machine at EXPERT-TÜNKERS

With the turn of the years2017/2018, TÜNKERS Ratingen hascommissioned a new hall that ismeant for reception and quality checkof the goods coming in. The new hallis located close to the high-bay ware-house, reducing the transport paths inthe plant dramatically. The goodsdelivered are now registered, checkedand stored in one building complex.

TÜNKERS Ratingen New GoodsReceipt Department + QS

New building at TÜNKERS Ratingen

Real Life Guys – Bathtub drone

On their own YouTube channelentitled “The Real Life Guys”, thetwins Philipp and JohannesMickenberger present their newestcreative developments. Their mostrecent project is flying to the next bak-ery in a bathtub. Together with thedrone expert Exabotix, the two young

men built a 70 kg bathtub drone fea-turing 6 electric motors, each 20 PSstrong, that is actually capable of fly-ing several hundred metres.

You can watch it at:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQK9m_OBVgY

Bathtub drone

Electric car clearly better thandiesel

Private parkings are rarelyequipped with charging stations. So itis no wonder that private customershesitate to buy an electric car. After all,who has got the time and ease tohope for a free charging station on apublic parking lota?

The vague legal situation concern-ing the costs of the installation ofcharging stations is quite a challengefor private persons because landlordsoften refuse to install them. After all,the mere installation of a charging sta-

tion for € 2,000 is often not sufficient,because especially older buildingsrequire a renovation of the entirepower network which results in a five-digit investment total plus futuremaintenance costs. Especially inapartment buildings, it is often difficultto obtain the agreement of all owners.As long as this problem is not serious-ly tackled by the government, the offi-cial buyer’s premium of € 4,000 willnot be sufficient to convince con-sumers of buying an electric car.

Lack of charging stations

Hanover – the city of the VW minibus

Source: Der Spiegel Nr.13/24.03.2018, S.119

Not least since the accident thathappened with a Uber vehicle has itbecome obvious that we are still faraway from the breakthrough of driver-less vehicles.

The sensors, especially the laserscanners, provide for orientation andsafety in perfect weather, but in snow-fall or fog, they become disoriented.This is when the driver must intervenebecause the radar sensors cannotensure precise object recognition.

The same problem occurred withthe parking robots used at DüsseldorfAirport. When pollen dispersal startedlast spring, an increasing number oflaser scanners failed.

Maybe we have to realize thatautonomous driving is rather suitablefor the sun-kissed Silicon Valley thanfor Central Europe with its moderateweather.

In 1956, the VW plant in Hanover(Stöcken) was built especially for theproduction of the successful VWtransporter. In the meantime, the plantwas also used to build the VW LT andthe body of the Porsche Panamera.VW Hanover is associated with thesuccess of the VW minibus. That iswhy it is good news that VW decidedto produce the successor model T7right here. But there is a lot more to

see in Hanover, e.g. an interesting oldtown, the famous town hall, theSprengel Museum showing art of the20th century, the Wilhelm-Busch-Museum with the adjacentHerrenhausen gardens or the MusicalFactory Hannover presenting currentmusicals. We recommend to visit thecity when it is not so crowded as dur-ing trade fairs and stay e.g. at theAlexander Business Hotel.

City hall of Hanover

Autonomous vehicles needgood weather?

Nanas at the banks of the Leine river

In Germany, 34,000 people diefrom air pollution every year (3.3 mil-lion worldwide). The main cause is nottraffic (20%), as one would guess, butagriculture (45%) with an excessiveutilisation of fertilizers that emit ammo-nia into the atmosphere which is trans-formed to nitrate and finally to nitricoxide. Somewhat exaggerating, wecould say that the cow is more of a

hazard than the car. The followingcomparisons are quite interesting, too:one hour of chimney fire correspond toa 100 km car ride, three cigarettescause ten times as much particulatematter as a Euro-3 diesel car. Factsthat show that electric vehicles areonly a small part of the changerequired in our society.

Cows more hazardous than cars?

© i-picture

In February, registration of privateand rental cars has been stopped inSingapore as a result of the growingpopulation and increasing scarcity ofland. Those who want to continueusing their own car need a certificate

to buy one which may cost up to e26,000 in addition to the regular pur-chase price, of course. After 10 years,you can either buy another certificateor scrap the car.

Photo: Singapore

Mehr Informationen zu Produkten und Anwendungen aus dieser Ausgabe senden wir Ihnen gerne zu. Redaktion: Olaf Tünkers · Texte: Katharina Sühling, Olaf Tünkers

TÜNKERS® Maschinenbau GmbH · Am Rosenkothen 4-12 · D-40880 Ratingen · Tel. +49 (0) 2102 4517-0 · info@tuenkers.de · www.tuenkers.de

Layout, Satz, Druck: Druckerei H. von Ameln, Ratingen

The construction of our new plantin the Czech Republic has been start-ed.

On the premises in Týn nad Vltavouby the Moldova River, a 10,000 sqmplant for the production of clamps,belt components and grippers byTÜNKERS Czech is being erected.Completion is scheduled for this sum-mer which means that production atthe new site will probably start in latesummer of 2018.

New plantTÜNKERS Czech

Premises ofTÜNKERS in

Týn nad Vltavou

Singapore stops registration ofprivate cars

It was Henry Ford who asked theartist Diego Rivera in 1932/1933 totake his automotive assembly plantinto the Detroit Institute of ArtsMuseum. The largest wall painting inthe museum was inspired by the thenlargest automotive assembly plant ofthe world, the Ford River Rouge Plantwhere the Model T was producedamong others. It goes without sayingthat the impressive painting by DiegoRivera also shows the entrepreneurHenry Ford and his son Edsel.

Ford plant,Diego Rivera

Art meetsautomotivemanufacturing