The milestone vehicle is a Magma Red Opel Astra notchback sedan with a 1.8-litre petrol engine, destined for the Russian market.
Working three shifts and employing 3,200 people, the plant is one of the youngest but least automated GM facilities in Europe. Since it opened in 1998, the plant’s body shop is only 35% automated. However, it is still one of the highest rated GM factories in Europe for build quality, with 96.7% of all cars going from quality control to logistics without stops for repairs.
“We are 3.3% short of ideal,” said factory director Romuald Rytwinski. “This is absolutely a top world score. In some other plants you see fleets [of cars being repaired.] In our case, 59 vehicles.”
Apart from the third-generation Opel Astra notchback sedan, Gliwice's other products are the Opel Zafira minivan and the second-generation Astra Classic.
In the January-October period, Gliwce built 151,789 vehicles, including 13,116 units of the Opel Agila, 29,827 of the second-generation Astra Classic, 8,091 of the third-generation Astra notchback sedan, as well as 100,755 Zafiras.
In April, General Motors Europe announced its plan to allocate assembly of its next-generation compact-sized cars to four manufacturing plants: Ellesmere Port, UK; Bochum, Germany; Trollhattan, Sweden; and Gliwice, Poland.
