In Finland, every thousand of Ponsse machines produced are celebrated. That was also the case when machine no. 14,000 rolled out of the factory late January 2019. I thought it might be interesting to see how long time it takes to build 1000 forest machines for Ponsse? What’s the production pace for this CTL-machine manufacturer?
I googled all the even thousands of Ponsse machines produced from No. 7000 to this year’s 14000. Quite interesting indeed. Here’s the result:
Machine no. 14000, January 26, 2019
Ponsse Elephant King, customer in Uruguay
Production pace: 1000 machines per year.
Machine no. 13000, January 24, 2018
Ponsse Ergo 8w, customer in Germany
Production pace: 1100 machines per year.
Machine no. 12000, February 21, 2017
Ponsse Scorpion King, customer in France
Production pace: 1020 machines per year.
Machine no. 11000, March 3, 2016
Ponsse Ergo 8w, customer in Hungary
Production pace: 920 machines per year
Machine no. 10000, January 30, 2015
Ponsse Scorpion, customer in Canada
Production pace: 770 machines per year
Machine no. 9000, October 10, 2013
Ponsse Elephant King, customer in Canada
Production pace: 600 machines per year
Machine no. 8000, February 7, 2012
Ponsse Ergo 8w, customer in Sweden
Production pace: 740 machines per year
Machine No. 7000, August 2010
Ponsse Ergo 8w, customer in Hungary
The first 7000 machines took 40 years to make (First Ponsse was built in 1970). The next 7000 took just over 8 years. It will be interesting to see how long it will takes before no 15000 is here?
New factory increases production volume?
It’s possible to trace Ponsse’s factory investment in the latest year’s production figures. The annual produced fell from 1,100 machines in 2017 to 1,000 machines in 2018. Most of the “dip” can probably be explained by the fact that the factory was closed for a period during summer. When moving into the new plant and laying the new production line. Some part of the dip might also derive to component shortage? This year, 2019, the produced volumes should increase as the new factory is now up and running. Here are more text and pictures (even a video) from the factory when Fredrik and I were there last year right before opening.
2013 was a poor year
It is possible to see a dip in the production also in 2013. It was obviously a horrible year for the forest contractors. This can also be seen in national registration statistics from countries such as Sweden and Finland.
More than 60% of CTL machines are manufactured in Finland
It’s not just Ponsse who manufactures their forest machines in Finland. It’s also Logset and Sampo-Rosenlew. And of course John Deere who manufactures their machines in Joensuu, eastern Finland. John Deere has an estimated production pace of about 1400 CTL-machines per year and Ponsse managed to make 1100 in the old factory. This means that more than 60 percent of all CTL machines sold worldwide are manufactured in Finland!
Now Komatsu Forest is planning to expand the CTL-factory in Umeå, Sweden. Due to that, it’s likely that the number of Swedish-produced forest machines will increase in the future. Today I guess that 1100-1200 forwarders and harvesters are being built in Sweden, in total. By Komatsu Forest, Rottne, EcoLog and Gremo. Then we can also add the smaller machines from Malwa, Terri and Vimek.
