Dense traffic and high speed characterises everyday life on roads. This puts increasing demands on the field of vehicle engineering for higher vehicular safety and comfort. The steering system plays a major part in fulfilling this requirement.
ZF Steering Gear (India) Ltd. (ZF INDIA) was incorporated in the year 1981 as a joint venture ZF Friedrichshafen AG.
ZF INDIA is a Pioneer in Manufacturing and Supply of Ball and Nut Integral Hydraulic Power & Worm and Roller Mechanical Steering System in India. Its plant is located at Village Vadu Budruk, Taluka- Shirur, 28 km away from Pune, on Pune - Ahmednagar Highway, in the western part of India. Pune is a major automotive hub with OEM like Force Motors, General Motors, Mercedes Benz, Mahindra Trucks & Bus Ltd, TATA Motors, etc. Present installed capacity of the plant is 2,00,000 units of Worm and Roller Mechanical Steering Gears and 3,75,000 units of Ball and Nut Integral Hydraulic Power Steering Gears.
ZF INDIA has state of the art technology in Design & Manufacturing various types of Power Steering Systems and Mechanical Steering Systems based on customers needs. It is continuously in the process of widening its product base to meet the increasing demands of automotive market and is keen to diversify in appropriate product lines.
ZF INDIA has an established business management system with certification for IATF 16949:2016 It has created service and spare parts network of around 60 dealers uniformly spread all over India, Nepal, Middle East, South Africa and Bangladesh to address to all its customer’s needs.
ZF INDIA has an established structure for carrying out various facets of manufacturing functions as per business process defined by IATF 16949:2016 . It has adopted lean manufacturing systems and has employee strength of around 1000 personnel.
ZF INDIA’s Product Range:
Manufacturing Equipments:
Heat Treatment Equipment and facilities:
ZF INDIA has state of the art heat treatment facility comprising,
Heat treatment processes carried out include:-
The Products Manufactured by ZF INDIA are duly designed and developed as per its customers requirement. The products are manufactured with at most care for cleanliness, smooth function in operation, easily accessible fitment and long life cycle. It has a zero defect (with Pokayoke Concept) assembly line for assembly of Steering systems for HCV, LCV, MUV/ SUV, Passenger Cars, Tractors etc.
ZF INDIA has a self sufficient in house Tool Room for supporting and maintaining various services like tool Re-sharpening, Grinding etc; required for conducting the manufacturing activity continuously. It has all the necessary material handling devices to ensure safe and smooth transportation of material within the plant.
Manufacturing Concepts:
1. Lean cellular manufacturing
2. Adaptation of principles of 5S. (link 5S to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5S_(methodology))
3. Continuous Improvements - Kaizen. (Link Kaizen to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaizen)
4. Kanban, First In, First Out (F.I.F.O.)
5. TQM and TPM
The processes are monitored, controlled and qualified as per the set parameters and all production and quality assurance activities are managed by team of qualified and experienced engineers and workmen under the leadership of the chief metallurgist. The steering system of an Automobile falls under category of Safety critical part and essentially very special steels and other materials of unique compositions are selected and used after proper heat treatment operations. Hence, ZF INDIA has created the necessary infrastructure for heat treating up to 500T/ Month, including a modern metallurgical laboratory and special process techniques that are required to achieve the desired Metallurgical performance standards.
All key equipment has been provided with complete power back up to ensure the uninterrupted process which is essential for excellent metallurgical properties.
Quality Control Equipment in Standards Room
In House design facilities for:
The main features of ZF INDIA products are easy operation, compact, trouble free steer ability, easy adjustments and positive road feel, to name a few.
Quality Assurance equipment in Standards Room:
* Fully CNC Three Coordinate Measuring machine with PH20 Probe
* Zeiss Contour Tracer
* Zeiss RONDCOM60A for Roundness testing
* Zeiss Surface Roughness Measuring machine
* Portable Co-ordinate measuring machine FARO Make
* Mahr Universal Length Measuring machine (Helios)
* Trimos Metroscope for calibration of Gauges
ZF INDIA’s valuable customers are:
Power Steering Gears:
Mechanical Steering Gears: