This morning we started off with an early breakfast in the hotel before going to the Hoerbiger company visit, our first company visit of the trip! The bus ride was around an hour, but went really fast. When we got to the company, some of the employees greeted us and took us into a room where they gave us a brief introduction to the company.
The tour consisted of two parts, one at the valve factory and one at a factory where they produced synchronizers for transmissions in cars. We started our tour at valve factory, where we learned about the product itself as well as its applications. One important part of the valves was something called Piezo technology, which is a material that bends when electricity is applied to it. They use these to create extremely sensitive, fast, and energy efficient valves for use in many cases. Some examples of use they gave us were for ventilators for babies, machines for eye surgery, and even for use in laser cutting machines. After learning about the valves, they gave us a tour of the factory and offices. Everything in the factory was very clean and modern, with mostly white walls and glass cases for the machines. To go inside the work area we had to wear lab coats and shoe covers.
The employees also seemed pretty young. The offices had a lot of open space and were also very modern looking.
After this tour, we drove to another factory near by to learn about their synchronizer plant. They gave us refreshments when we got there, and then we embarked on the tour of the factory. This factory was much older looking and also much bigger. It was a much less modern facility, and much more open. I was surprised multiple times when our tour guide would walk up to production lines and just grab products off the line in different stages of development. The entire process was fascinating and I really enjoyed it. Everything at this factory seemed more rough and gritty than the valve factory, which was very interesting. At the end, they gave us a presentation on some of the upcoming technologies that they are looking into to make sure their company stays in a good position with the switch to electric vehicles. They described how they can use some of their current machinery and processes in electric vehicles, one example would be using their products in the process of engaging or disengaging an axle in a 4 wheel drive vehicle to save power. One thing I found interesting at the valve factory was that they have a very diverse range of customers. An advantage this gave them was that during covid, most customers had less demand, but their demand for ventilators went way up! This led to them not losing any sales during the pandemic.
After the visits, we went to a small city called Oberammergau, where we took a gondola to the top of a mountain by the Swiss Alps. The view was beautiful and we spent a lot of time just walking around and looking at the mountains. After we got cold, we rode back down and split up and found a spot for dinner. Today, I got some Bratwurst and potato salad which was amazing. Another great day in Germany!
