Sept 5, 2007 - Veeyes Foundry Coimbature

Today we travelled to Coimbature from Chennai and back again all in one day. Veeyes Foundry sent a van to pick us up and drive for 1 hour to their factory. The interior was quite custom with brown crushed velour headliner, cloth seats and lace curtains. We all pushed the curtains aside and saw much poverty in this area. One of our team was missing due to "Delhi Belly" and he could not stray to far from a "s_itting" chair.







Once outside of town, the landscape became more lush and desolate. The factory was located down a small road off the main highway. I joked with the guys that I could not have found this place with a GPS and 3 days. The mountain in the background was quite amazing to us all as to its suggestive shape.

Veeyes is privately owned. They provide carbon steel and stainless steel valve forgings to AIL. The owner was very knowledgeable of all aspects of the plant and ran it with a firm hand. We would ask one of his people a question and he would answer for them. In spite of this, the company seems quite capable of producing the products our project needs. They have been certified by TUV with an ISO 9000 certificate. Veeyes had the work processes, quality systems, and testing companies require to compete with other international companies.

The biggest difference between the US and India is safety. Second is literacy. Regarding safety, most of the workers did not have shoes and instead wore sandals or flip flops or were barefoot. The only safety helmets were in the overhead crane area. We asked the owner about this and he said the workers are given shoes, safety glasses, helmets, and other safety equipment but don't use them or sell them (even though their wages were 5 to 10 times minimum wage and all lived in permanent homes). Workers were using safety equipment where it made sense. For example, workers at the kiln wore gloves, face masks, and aprons because of the heat. Workers in grinding wore much the same except not as heat resistant.

The workers are composed of covenented, management, supervisors, skilled, and then unskilled. Covenanted is a British term for an employee with a contract which is usually the top most people. Illiteracy begins at skilled and most of the unskilled labor. Safety meetings are held weekly. Drawings are used to help those that can't read. The supervisors are responsible to communicate to all the employees what the requirements are.

Sept 3, 2007 - Audco

Today we met the Audco India Limited (AIL) team that will be supplying the valves for my project. AIL is a joint venture with Flowserve in the USA. AIL takes foundry castings of valves and machines them to the final dimensions and assembles the parts together. The meetings were quite productive and began the critical relationships that teams need to succeed. The last member of the client team, Tony (Becht Engineering, West Virginia branch), arrived the previous night and met us all for the first time. He is a corrosion expert hired by the client.

Everyone at AIL was professional, courteous, and desiring to meet the client's expectations.

Aravind and I are standing across from the main AIL entrance in front of the landscaped gardens.

Sept 2 - 5, 2007 - Radisson Hotel Chennai

The trip from Delhi to Chennai was quite smooth. We were served hot (temperature and spice) Indian meals, vegetarian or non-vegetarian on the Jet Airways flight. The stewardesses were constantly working bringing food, drinks, pillows, etc. to the passengers and always with a smile. Quite different attitude from the US airlines. Security is somewhat different but sufficient. All checked bags are x-rayed and sealed with a security tape. Hand bags are all x-rayed. Computers don't have to be removed from their cases and liquids are allowed. Each person is frisked. There is a separate line for women that has a curtain.

The photo is of the team that is travelliing together for the next week. From left to right, me, Dave (from Flowserve Canada), Doug (Flowserve Canada), Jay (Flowserve Canada), Shawn (Fluor Calgary), and Aravind (Fluor New Delhi). The Radisson has a famous restaurant, the Kabob Factory. The menu is basically fixe price, the choices being vegetarian or non-vegetarian. The servers, all male, bring food until you burst. I had mutton, fish, chicken, each served 2 or 3 different ways. They also brought salad, bread, rice, cooked vegetables, and dessert.

The hotel lobby was quite nice.

Here is the next photo of the bedroom in the continuing effort to "document" the different accomodations.

Aug 31, 2007 - The Hotel

Left Greenville on time. Hung around the American Airlines Admirals Club for 6 hours. Read 47 work emails of which 26 required action and answered/forwarded 18 of those. Left Chicago on time and arrived in New Delhi 1 hour ahead of schedule. The flight was quite uneventful besides a gentleman who coughed in his sleep through out the flight. Another man left his computer on with its WiFi card on so it was searching for an access pint every 6 seconds. I know because I counted each time the hard drive was accessed as the WiFi port searched. He also slept with his reading light on his white shirt and a newspaper over his face. I don't understand why he didn't turn the light off and use the airline provided blindfold. My business class priority bag was next to last off. I think they take them off the plane alphabetically. Getting through passport control and customs was no problem and actually walked out of the airport 1 hour after landing.

Vaidyanathan met me at the airport. He escorted me out to the driver and arrived at the Crowne Plaza about 30 minutes later. The Crowne Plaza is south of the airport and south of the Fluor offices in Gurgaon. It is brand new and quite different from Uppal's Orchid where we stayed on the first trip. It is much more cosmopolitan and energetic with an Indian flair. The bar is a large oval with red lit counter top.

In fact, the whole room is oval with fiber optic lights.

Here is a photo of the bedroom. There are electric motor operated curtains everywhere.

Including the window between the bathroom and bedroom!

The whole hotel is wireless. It is a 5 star western-style which, I think, means the rooms are western-style with large bed, privacy, shower, tub, and sitting commode.

There are two other restaurants, Cafe G which is the main restaurant and served the breakfast buffet. The other is a Brazilian restaurant, "the only one in Delhi," and is named Wildfire.

There is an outdoor pool designed so that the water comes up to the edge of the concrete. I almost walked into it thinking it was a puddle. The hotel has lots of dynamic art that moves in the breeze or changes color. There are lots of lit candles which I thought was unusual until the power went out 4 times Friday night (only for 10-15 seconds).

Itinerary

Aug 30 Greenville
Aug 31 - Sept 2 Delhi
Sept 3 - 5 Chennai
Sept 6 Kolhapur
Sept 7 Bangalore
Sept 8 - 9 Chennai
Sept 10 - 14 Delhi
Sept 15 Greenville