Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Belgium April 2018

So i have had this abandoned factory in Gosselies on my radar for quite some time, possibly before it had even closed. I had a look on my previous trip but it wasn't feasible to attempt at midday with lots of contractors on site.

Skip forward a few weeks and a return visit in the early hours become far more productive. We find ourselves inside in a huge warehouse, its totally empty. We head on and it doesn't seem too promising a few bits but nothing really interesting and then another empty warehouse. Its not looking good and while trying to be discrete we trigger sensors for large automated roller doors which certainly made us jump.

We make a run through no mans land to the next building, we make it inside and finally find what we are looking for!!

After shooting the large number of robots and other various bits we attempt to head on to the next building and are fairly close when we spot contractors entering the building in a van. We have no idea how they didn't see us. We realise we have outstayed our welcome and decide to make the long journey back through the site. This results in a game of cat and mouse as more workers arrive but we eventually leave undetected.

Production started at this 100 hectare site in 1965 producing hydraulic excavators and medium wheeled loaders. Within two years the site was pumping out 40 machines a month. Various expansions took place over the years but in 2013 there were losses of over 1000 staff even though 200 million euros was invested in the site shortly leading up to this. I would guess the investments were in automation to reduce production costs. Sadly during 2017 production here ceased with the loss of around 2000 jobs. This was a heavy blow to the city of Charleroi where around one in four people are unemployed.

Due to a dispute between the government and Caterpillar the site was sold to the government for one euro. The site was being maintained in the hope of an investor taking it on. Well luck may be in for the city of Charleroi. The Chinese company Thunder Power are now in discussions of taking on the site to produce electric vehicles here.

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Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Sunrise on the roof.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: The first area we find is paint spraying/finishing area for large parts.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Paint spraing production line.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Paint spraying robots that even had their own overalls.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Another part of the finishing process.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: So my original thoughts were this is a finished goods warehouse. Having noticed the cranes maybe it was a maual producton floor.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: It was a vast space.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: We finally make it to another building and find production lines.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: First we find a large amount of kilns or furnaces.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Pipework around the furnaces.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Small pipes and valves.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: A closer look at the pipes and valves.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Wrokspace around the kilns.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: They all varied in sizes.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Larger kilns and production lines.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: More of the furnace area.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies:

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: More furnaces and control panels.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Small control panel and valves.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Minganti Hercules turning lathe. These things weigh in at over 20,000kg!!

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Closer look at the lathe.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Inside a different lathe.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: A different type of lathe with control panel.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: More production lines and a lathe.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: We finally find some ABB robots.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: They all have different heads.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Robot head and control panel

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: ABB Robot on the production line.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: A close up of the head on the robot.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Paint spraying.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: Inside the paint sprayer.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: The paintspraying automation schematics on a touch screen.

Caterpillar Manufacturing Plant Gosselies: By this time a number of workers are beginning to appear and we had to head back leaving all of this unexplored.

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