Adrian Morton continues his account of his visit to Yutong’s 134-hectare production facility in China, capable of turning out over 400 buses and coaches per day
In last week’s issue, we arrived in China and after a day of sightseeing at the Great Wall, were treated to a high-speed ‘Bullet Train’ ride to China’s seventh city and home to the Yutong mega-factory, Zhengzhou in Hanan Province. Along with some well-known UK coach operators, we began our tour of the factory, astounded by the sheer volume of new vehicles awaiting collection that same day.
After completing a visit to the visitor centre and the company’s museum it was back on our ‘business bus’ for a short drive to the main manufacturing facility, the scale of which really has to be seen to be appreciated. Witnessing an entire line of bus and coach body shells being dipped in huge vats or baths of degreaser was a spectacle to behold. This is just one of the many processes ahead of the electro-coating for anti-corrosion protection, ensuring whole life cycle protection and a paint finish without blemish. The technology is the same as that used by many of the world’s top car makers, such as BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Volkswagen.
We continued to tour the factory, firstly to the coach area where a good number of vehicles for the company’s home market were under construction, the design very reminiscent of the 1990s Neoplan Cityliner, before moving onto the bus division where all manner of sizes of vehicle were in production, with drivelines from conventional diesel to electric. The efficiencies were obvious to see with the factory environment more akin to that of a hospital; the floors were so clean you could have eaten your dinner off them!
Moving outside you could again be forgiven for forgetting that we were literally in the middle of a bus and coach factory. The internal path and road system is lined with trees, shrubbery and flowers. It was only a short walk to our next location but some of the group chose to make use of the autonomous buses that run around the complex, moving workers from one part of the vast site to another.
First put into use in 2021 the Xiaoyu 2.0 Autonomous Bus won the ‘Red Dot Award,’ making it the first Chinese bus to achieve this recognition, sharing its ‘intelligent and connected technology’ with the world.
It could only be viewed from a distance but a large unit housed several bays where vehicles were tested for water ingress by being continually drenched by high pressure water jets. Noted was a right-hand drive GT12 in FlixBus livery destined for a UK operator.
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