Stellantis Enhances Bodyshop Efficiency by 97% with Inbolt’s Vision-Guided De-Racking Solution
Stellantis cut downtime by 97% at its Detroit plant by retrofitting a FANUC cell with Inbolt’s vision-guidance system, eliminating pick errors without mechanical rework and achieving ROI in just 3 months.
Customer: Stellantis
Location: Detroit, United States
Return on Investment: 3 months
Challenge
In body-in-white (BIW) automation, custom racks are used to ensure the reliable and repeatable pick-and-place of parts before loading them into the welding line. However, at Stellantis’ Detroit Assembly Complex – Jefferson, the Body Side Outer Aperture unloading cell was experiencing breakdowns, leading to significant maintenance.
Key Issues
The apertures to be picked lacked a repeatable position, due to:
- Wear and tear on racks over time, causing misalignment of parts.
- Manual part loading, introducing placement errors.
- Inconsistent positioning of racks loaded by forklifts, despite mechanical indexing.
Impact
Because of these displacements, the robot’s laser-based detection failed to locate the parts reliably, leading to multiple breakdown per day as the robot collided with the racks during pick attempts.
Solution
Inbolt retrofitted the existing FANUC robot cell with its real-time vision-guidance solution.
A camera was mounted directly on the robot’s End-of-Arm Tooling (EOAT):
- The AI was trained to accurately identify and locate the apertures, even with variations in position
- Inbolt dynamically recalculates the robot's pick trajectory based on the live position of the part.
Additionally, a safety zone was implemented. If a part is detected outside the safe picking envelope, Inbolt triggers an abort mission signal. This prevents the robot from proceeding, avoiding collisions and allowing an operator to intervene and adjust the rack as needed.
Success Metrics
- Breakdowns reduced by 97%: From 184 mins/day in February to 4.9 mins/day in January 2025.
- Zero collisions since install: Production uptime significantly increased with no collisions since deployment (as of June 2025).
- 3 months: the payback period.
“Implementing vision to retrofit the line transformed a high-risk, high-maintenance station into a reliable and robust cell, without the need for mechanical re-engineering. We are scaling the project on similar cells in the plant”.
— Loda Bazzi, Maintenance Manager, Stellantis Jefferson plant.