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Produetion Miracle At Willow Run

Charlie Sorensen'sStorY
In Jammry of 1940,Arneriea was being drawn into
the grou,iigwar and our military was woefalty ,
Insidethe (Consolidated)
onpluporc a. The Roosevelt administration asked plant I watchedmenPutting
Ford Motor Company to manufacture components
iogetherwing sectionsand
for the B-24 Liberator bomber' Charles Sorensen'
lo portionsof the fuselage.The
Vice-Presiderx of Productionfor Ford traveled
work of putting togethera
San Diego ta obseme Consolidated Air*afi's
fow-enginebomberwas
ooerariins. Here is his fuscription of the visit and
manytimesmore
iow he conceived the Lltillow Run bomber plant that
complicatedthanassemblinga four-cylinder
eventually manufacured 8,800 of these ,.
oJ automobile.but what I sawremindedme of nearly
aircraft.i,Yillow Run was the physical embodimenr
laier thirty-five yearspreviouslywhen we were making
the Fird Prodttction systemwhichwas
Model N Fordsat the PiquetteAvenueplant. This
*awformed by Toyota into "Just In Time" and Lean
This is where it all sturted' was beforeWalter Flandersrearrangedour machines
*oni\ortoring.
and eight yearsbeforewe achievedthe orderly
sequence of the assemblyline andmassproduction'

delivcr eachu,nitin its propersequence!o the

I reallvdid havesomethingin mind' To comparea
assemblyline to makeonewhole unit- finished
FordV-E with a four-engineLiberatorbomberwas
but despite plane.
like matchinga garagewith a slcyscraper,
their greatdi{ferinces I knew the samefundamentals
To houseall this andprovidefor efficient operation
appliedto high-volumeproduciionof both,the same
thereshouldbe a new plant speciallydesignedto
asihev *ould to an elecbic eggbeateror to a wrist
accommodatethe progressivelayout. I saw no
watch,
impossibility in suchan ideaeventhoughmass
productionofanything approachingthe sizeand
Firsl breakthe plane'sdesigninto essentialunits and
complexityof a B-24 neverhad beenattempted
makea separateproductionlayout for each-unit'
before.
Noc, build asmany units as arerequired,then

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But who;ould accepfsuchfwild notion?end
insteadof one bombera day by the prevailing method
I sawthe possibility of one B-24 an hour by mass
productionassembiylines. How could the aviation
peopletakethat estimateseriously?
As soonasI returredto my roomatthe Coronado
Hotel, I beganfiguring how to adaptFord assembly
methodsto airplaneconstructionandtum out one
four-enginebomberan hour.
Throughouttheday I had
madecopiousnotes.I
listed all major units of
the planeandthe subunits
and fractional units
requiredfor their
assembly,and I had
gatheredfigures on
Consolidated'slabor force andjob performance.
From theseI computedeachunit operation,its
timing andrequiredfloor spaceas I sawthem, and
paperbeganto fly. Figuresfor eachunit I kept
togetlrerin a separatepiie, and soontherewere iittie
stacksof paperall over the floor of my room.
I rvasbackat my old ganneofsketching a seriesof
manufacturingand subassemblyoperationsand their
orderly progressiontoward becomingmajor units-- a
gameI had playedmanytimes sincethat morning in
t908 at the PiquetteAvenueplantwhenwe first
experimentedwith a moving assemblyline.
Again I was practicingmy productionplanning
philosophy,which stemmedfrom my pattemmaking
dayswhen I fashionedwoodenmodelsof Henry
Ford'shalf-thought-outdesigns:"Unlessyou seea
thing, you cannotsimplify it. And unlessyou can
simplify it, it's a good sign you can'tmakeiL"As I
look back now uponthat night, t}is wasthe biggest
challengeofmy productioncareer-biggerthan any
Model T assemblyline sequencefor Highland Park'
more momentousthan the layout and constructionof
the greatRiver Rougeplant in which I'd had a part. It
took eight yearsto developFordosmassproduction
system,and eight more yearsbeforewe worked up to
a productionof 10,000carsa day.
Now, in one night, I wasapplying thirty-five yearsof
productionexperienceto planningthe layout for
building not only scmethingI had neverput together
before,but the largestand most complicatedof all air
transportand in numbersand at a rate neverbefore
thoughtpossible.
OnceagainI wasgoingon the principleI had
enunciatedmany times at Ford: "The only thing we
can't makeis somethingwe can'tthink about."
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fnro"gtt-tnost of the night I setdown figuresand
o"ni*i *t"*. I arrangedand rearrangedthe stacksof
paper,as it becameplainerto me which unit came
;ft;t tlt" other in moving to final assemblyandhow
much floor spacewall involved.
At lengththe whole pictwe becameclear and simple'
I kne;I hadthe solution, and I waselatedby the
certaintythat the Germanshad neitherthe facilities
nor the conceptionfor greaterbombermass
procluction.
Towardsfour o'clock, I was satisfiedthat my piles of
paperwerearrangedin properorder andrepresented
itri most logical progressof units to the main
assemblyline; and I knew I could prove a -
consfuction rate of one big bomberan hour' Now I
had somethingto talk aboul
Standingover the papers,I roughedout on Coronado
Hotcl nJtepapera pencil sketohofthe floor plan ofa
bomberplani. It would be a mile long and a quarter
mile wid-e,the biggestsingleindushial building ever'
I still havethat sketch,initialed by EdselFord, his
two sonsandothersoandI still get a kick out ofit'
The result of one night'shard work, it is the true
outline of Willow Run, which took two yearsto build
and camethroughon schedulewith one four-engine
Liberator an hour, 18 bomben a day, andby the end
of the war a total of 8,800big planesoffthe assembly
lines &ndinto the air.
.When
I finished my sketchI went to be{ but was so
carriedaway by entbusiasmfor the project that I
couldn't sf.rp. i was building planesthe rest of the
niCht.
at Ureaffast*ittr Edsel(Ford) the next morning I
was somewhatwoozy tls I showedhim the sketchand
outlinsd the bomber-an-hourproposition'
He was in completeaccordand assuredme that Ford
Motor Companywould build sucha plant. My high
respectfor him went higherthan ever.We spentan
hour together,gesing set for a meetingin Major
Fleet'soffice io shootthe works on a $200,0(D,000
propositionbackedonly by a penciledsketch.
Willow Runbecamea reality. It was the embodiment
of American ingemity, perseveranceand
produu*ity. Here are someof the statistics:
r 488,193parts
o 30'0{D eomponents
o 24 Major subassemblies
r Peakproduction-25 units PerdaY
. 25,(X)0initirl engineeringdrawings
r Ten modelchange in six Ycars
r Thousandsofrunning changes
. 34,533cmployeesat p€k
o ProductivitY imPnovemcnt
l(di0o/o
SORENSEN,CHARLES E., My Forty YearsWith
Ford.New York: W.W. Norlon, 1956.
LACEY, ROBERT, Ford: The Men andThe
Machine,Boston,MA, Little Brown, 1986-
KIDDER, WARREN BENJAMIN, Willow Run:
Colossrisof AmericanIndustry,Lansing,MI, KFT'
1995.
Sameillustrations Are takenftom: Willow Run:
Colossusof Amerieanldus,try fu WarrenB. Kidder
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andrewdownard@gmail.com
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Charles E. Sorensen'sOriginal Sketches

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CompletedPlant (Albert Kahn, Architect)

Contact Andrew Downard * 0419 58 I 705

andrewdownard@gnail -com
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Con{act Ardrerv Downard - 04 I 9 58 ! 705

andreu'downard@gnai l.com