Minews - GM plans to use aluminium in pickups

(Minews) - General Motors has signed supply contracts with Alcoa and Novelis ahead of plans to increase the use of aluminium sheet in its next-generation pickup trucks by late 2018, according to a Wall Street Journal report.

The move marks a major shift in the use of aluminium sheet in domestic automotive manufacturing and further bolsters the notion that lightweighting has become the single-most important factor for automakers looking to meet federal fuel-efficiency standards.

Dearborn, Michigan-based Ford Motor unveiled its aluminiumbodied 2015 F-150 last month.

“It’s a changeover to our manufacturing facilities, our stamping plants and body construction facilities and assembly plants. But we’ve got a lot of experience in aluminium already,” Raj Nair, Ford’s group vp for product development, told Metal Bulletin sister title AMM during the unveiling at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit. “We are spending over $1 billion at the Kansas City plant (in Missouri) for the Ford Transit and the F-150.”

Atlanta-based Novelis would not confirm that the company had recently signed supply contracts with GM. “While we cannot speak to any specific customers or products, we anticipate more automakers, domestic and international, to make announcements regularly in
the following years that will transform the automotive industry,” Marco Palmieri, Novelis North America president, told AMM.

The company works “closely with all of the auto manufacturers to talk about design and technology concepts”, he added.

Palmieri noted that “discussions about adopting more aluminium in a vehicle typically happen years in advance as the use of aluminium influences many other decisions in the manufacturing process”.

In anticipation of the spike in aluminium demand over the next decade, Novelis recently invested in three automotive finishing lines that are “dedicated to meeting the dramatic shift in demand for aluminium used for automotive”, Palmieri said. “Two of the lines are running now and construction has begun on the third.”

A spokeswoman for Pittsburgh-based Alcoa also declined to comment on any potential partnership with GM. “We don’t comment on who our customers are,” she said. “We are clearly entering the era of the aluminium vehicle.