General Motors Co. in Detroit and Japan’s Isuzu have announced a $175 million investment through their DMAX joint venture to build an all-new diesel engine components plant in Brookville, Ohio. The 251,000-square-foot facility would expand the production of engine components for the current DMAX diesel engine manufacturing operation in Moraine, Ohio.
GM owns 60 percent of DMAX, and Isuzu Diesel Services of America Inc. owns the remaining 40 percent.
The new investment is expected to create more than 100 manufacturing jobs. Preliminary work has already begun, and construction is expected to be completed by the end of 2020. When the new site is up and running, it will operate concurrently with the current DMAX operations in Moraine.
“Strong demand for GM’s all-new family of Chevrolet and GMC heavy- and medium-duty pickups is driving us to find ways to build more Duramax diesel engines,” says Gerald Johnson, executive vice president of global manufacturing for GM. “The Brookville investment will enable us to machine more engine blocks and heads and ultimately enable our DMAX engine plant in Moraine to build more 6.6-liter diesel engines for our Flint truck assembly plant.”
Heavy-duty trucks make up about 25 percent of full-size pickup sales in the U.S. GM expects growth in this market and has consolidated heavy-duty pickup production at its Flint truck assembly plant, where the company installed new body and paint shops and created 1,000 new jobs to support a capacity increase of 40,000 units compared to the outgoing model.
GM launched its new Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra HD pickups earlier this year and began shipping to dealers in July. It plans to build inventory levels through the first half of 2020. The company is increasing production of crew cab and diesel models to meet customer demand.
Towing power and capacity in the new pickups come from the Duramax 6.6-liter V-8 turbodiesel.
DMAX has built more than 2 million diesel engines since the facility opened in 1999. It employs nearly 900, and its 670 hourly employees are represented by the International Union of Electronic, Electrical, Salaried, Machine, and Furniture Workers, AFL-CIO, A Division of the Communication Workers of America local 755.
