AUTO INDUSTRY : Progress Made in GM Plant Strike Talks : Labor: A factory in Oklahoma becomes the seventh to close because of a lack of parts from the struck facility in Lordstown, Ohio.

Negotiators for the United Auto Workers and General Motors Corp. ended talks late Wednesday after reporting progress toward settling a strike against a key parts plant in Lordstown, Ohio.

The break from lengthy negotiations assured that the strike will enter an eighth day today.

Meanwhile, a seventh GM assembly plant closed when the Oklahoma City factory ran out of Lordstown-supplied parts.

More than 32,500 assembly workers were idled Wednesday, as were thousands of others at plants that supply the closed GM facilities.

Neither side at Lordstown was discussing details of talks.

“There is progress but nothing I can quantify that specifically,” UAW spokesman Reg McGhee said.

Dave Fascia, bargaining chairman of UAW Local 1714 at GM’s metal-fabricating plant in Lordstown, said the pace of negotiations quickened after high-level meetings Monday night at GM headquarters in Detroit.

Fascia said that by Tuesday afternoon, the number of grievances that led to the local strike had been reduced to 30 or 40 from about 350.

Bargainers were believed to still be discussing GM’s plan to close a tool-and-die shop employing 240 workers and the company’s decision to run the parts plant with 125 fewer workers. Local 1714 represents about 2,400 workers.

Talks to head off a UAW strike at the adjacent Lordstown assembly plant also continued Wednesday. Local 1112 has threatened to strike Friday afternoon. The plant’s 7,000 workers already are furloughed because of the parts plant strike.

A union insider said negotiations to settle grievances over an air pollution problem and work assignments at the assembly plant were going well--meaning a strike might be avoided.

In addition to the seven GM plants closed and the 32,500 workers furloughed, reports of layoffs from plants that supply the closed assembly plants were growing.