Tapping into the growth means working at space-age speed, making prototypes of connectors or other wiring harness parts with a computer-guided rapid prototype machine that lays down thin layers of plastic or rubber over numerous passes, like an ink-jet printer producing a photo.

Automakers aren't quite ready to start making Jetson-type flying bubbles, but they are cramming today's vehicles with electric motors to power wheels, sensors to deploy airbags and entertainment devices to allow adults to survive a cross-country trip with children.

Connecting the electronic gadgets are as many as 2 1/2 miles of electrical wiring that, along with 600 plastic connectors and as many as 2,000 wire terminals, all weighing as much as 132 pounds - much of it coming from Delphi Packard Electric's Customer Technical Center in Champion.

''Demand will grow like crazy as we go to electric motors. That will drive the need for more connectors and wiring from Delphi. We want to be a part of that growth,'' Chris Burns, director of global innovation for Delphi Corp.'s Electrical/Electronic Architecture division, said last week.

So do Delphi Packard's hourly production workers. Tom Krolopp, shop chairman of International Union of Electrical Workers-Communications Workers of America Local 717, said the tech center provides more work for his 665 members, who make plastic connectors, metal terminals and electrical cable used to assemble wiring harnesses.

''Look at the projects for all-electric cars. They need a lot of wiring and plastics,'' he said.

Since the auto supplier's exit last October after four grueling years in Chapter 11 bankruptcy, Delphi Packard is counting on its patent-producing corp of engineers at Champion and five other tech centers worldwide to keep it in the forefront of an auto industry that's moving away from strictly oil-based fuel to hybrid or total electrical power.

''We can turn ideas into parts you can hold in your hand in hours,'' said Jerry Rinehart, superviso