Not a good start to our day.
It was raining. And we were
driving. Both suck.
Oddly as soon as we reached Munchen (we’re in Germany!) the
rain stopped! Munich has too much
traffic! We stopped at the hotel to drop
off our luggage and then continued three miles to BMW Welt (World) near the Olympic
Park.
BMW headquarters
The BMW Welt is a huge showroom of cars and motorcycles
(mostly new). Looking at the i8, I
overheard a guy say, “It is actually not too expensive if you think about it –
140 euro.” It is too bad we couldn’t
take this trip AND buy one … someday!
The i8 is impressive!
I think they want one
Our factory tour was fascinating, especially for the
guys. I’m certain our guide’s knowledge
was endless, but she only had two hours to give us information. I was required to put my camera in my bag so
even though I often thought to take a picture for you, I was not allowed.
Our tour walked us through the entire 40-hour process to
make a car. We started with the pressing
room which turns steel into body frames.
Next the body shop welds the pieces together. Then the car is painted. Lastly it is assembled together, and driven
out of the factory. At the end of the
tour, rather than a car, they gave us a brochure.
Tidbits from tour:
-
First, for those of you in the steel business –
they use 600 tons of steel daily.
-
They complete 1 car every minute (950/day).
-
They use 840 robots (plus humans too)
-
The tolerance for quality control is 0.2 mm
(depending, sometimes less)
-
Most of the cars leave the factory by train.
-
55% of the cars are painted black or white.
-
The average 40 year old line worker makes 40,000
euro/year, works 35 hours/week, and gets six weeks of vacation.
We were surprised that:
-
Rather than produce the same car over and over
(ie all M4s), every other car could be different because it didn’t slow down
production for the robots to change.
-
The big robotic arms were amazing, especially how they could
maneuver into the little cars.
-
The paint room smelled like fish. It was the most interesting to watch!
What better thing to do next than – in the honor of Friday
Happy Hour – find a bier garden in Munich!
We went to Augustiner Keller, one of the oldest bier
gardens in Munich! With 5,000 seats, it
is huge!
“It’s too heavy,” Kate said about her ½ liter of soda. How do they pick up two full liters in one
hand?
“Ja ja ja kuchen” is the drunken singing we hear. Chris translates…they want cake. Greg wants to learn German so that he can
sing along.
Food on the left, bier on the right
Chris was the only one who ordered dinner. The rest of us said beer and a huge mamma
pretzel was enough to eat. (We
discovered we much prefer German pretzels to Austrian ones, some of which we
found had rye seeds inside.) Chris
wanted to enjoy his food with his bier, but he couldn’t put his fork down
because the vultures – who “weren’t hungry” – were stealing his food.
Jeremy is shocked that an entire liter of bier does not affect him ... until he tries to get up. "I got this," he says, trying again.
The guys went to the bathroom and returned reporting that
guys have no line because it is a pee trough.
The girls went next. “Herren”
sounded feminine to me so in we went … to the pee trough. No one stopped us. Even though I am in the men’s bathroom, the
open door to the women’s room (ohhhh, Dammen!) is just a few feet further - so
we basically share anyway!
It’s a small world. We passed a Cal Poly sweatshirt. “Hey, Cal Poly!” I exclaimed! Turns out he was an incoming freshman too!
Logistics:
- I emailed BMW and they kindly offered to alert
me when the tickets went on sale. Sure
enough on January 28 they did, and I made our factory tour reservations (which
fills up quickly).
- At Augustine Keller, a liter of bier is 7.40, a
pretzel is 3.60, and currywurst with fries is 9.70.
- We are staying in a deluxe 1-bedroom (plus
kitchen) about a half-mile from the train station at Citadines Arnulfpark Hotel. It is a long walk, or short tram, to the
Marienplatz. I wanted to be closer, and
often searched for a different hotel, but could never find something comparable
to the rate I got: 339 euros for three
nights!
