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Toyota is a low-mix high-volume manufacturer of a limited variety of similar assemblies. Compared to Toyota, would you say that you are a high-mix low-volume manufacturer of a large variety of dissimilar components?

Several performance measures, such as Order Flow Time, Inventory Dollar Days (Work-In-Process Inventory) and $ Shipped per Day (Throughput), focus on the speed with which an order is shipped to and paid for by a customer (Cash Flow Velocity).    Now, Lean recommends to focus on the elimination of the Seven Wastes (Overproduction, Waiting, Transportation, Over-processing, Inventory, Operator Motion and Scrap/Rework).  Can the impact of Waste Elimination be measured using Cash Flow Velocity?

Does your product mix consist of 100’s, maybe 1000’s, of different components whose routings are dissimilar?

If you answered “Yes”, have you analyzed the product mix to find the groups of components with identical or similar manufacturing routings (aka “component families”)?  

Creation of flexible work instructions for an entire part family

Selection of flexible automation

Generation of quotes

Estimation of standard costs and times

Reduction of setup times when the same machine has to be changed over many times

Design of tooling families to plan tool magazine layouts for CNC machines

Standardization of part designs (Variety Reduction)

Rationalization of product  mix

Cross-training of employees

Automation of office processes

What is the current method for production control, operations scheduling and shop floor control?

Our product mix consists of several business segments ex. Runners, Repeaters, One-Off’s, etc.

We see our product mix change every year

Our product mix has a large number of products with dissimilar routings

Average Order Flow Time (= Ship Date – Start Date) is high

The value of inventory (Finished Goods, WIP and Raw) as a % of $ales is high

Lead Times quoted to customers are based on current Order Flow Times

Performance metrics are not based on Throughput, Operating Cost and Inventory

Vendor lead times are high, their deliveries are unpredictable and quality rejects are common

Limited work has been done to standardize products, and processes for our entire product mix

Limited work has been done to standardize products, and processes for our entire product mix

The material flow in the facility is chaotic

We could not manually map all the routings of our entire product mix

The layout of the facility “just happened over time” as the business grew

There is significant material handling activity involving fork lifts, bridge cranes, etc

There is significant walking around by employees having to search for tools, chat with friends, move product from their machines to other machines, search for material handling equipment to move orders that they have completed, etc.

We have a functional layout with equipment of the same or similar processing capabilities being co-located in one area

We have not explored how to implement manufacturing cells to produce families of parts

Product is moved on pallets and/or large storage containers for any inter-operation transfer

There is no visual LOS (Line Of Sight) for order progressing between key work centers

We have no knowledge of how much floor space in our current facility is wasted

Our layout is not flexible to handle changes in product mix and/or production volumes

We plan to re-layout the entire factory or portions of it

We plan to add a new building to expand the existing facility

We plan to move and re-locate into another facility

We plan to build a new facility and re-locate into that facility

We plan to add new equipment or replace existing equipment

Our $ales department pushes orders into production regardless of WIP levels

Our ERP system lacks good data especially BOM’s, Routers, Standard Times, etc.

Orders are released into production without good knowledge of available capacity, especially at system bottleneck/s

We rely on our ERP system to produce a daily schedule based on infinite capacity

We have an end-of-month frenzy to meet shipping revenue goals

We have to “search and find” to track down an order when a customer calls

Our on-floor tracking and inventory control of tooling and shop consumables is poor

Many work centers have significant number of orders in queue waiting to be processed

Too many setup changes occur due to repeated schedule changes

We have no formal program to reduce setup times on bottleneck equipment

We do not have a preventive maintenance schedule for our key equipment

Orders are released without complete paperwork

Orders are released without complete paperwork

The use of 5S in the office and in the factory is limited primarily to housekeeping

Each work center maintains a white board that tracks key metrics (SQDIP)

Employee performance in any work center is measured using Efficiency and Productivity

Machine operators rely on the Inspection department to check the quality of their work

The Owner, VP-Operations, Plant Manager, etc. visit the floor often

 

Employees can do problem-solving using 5 Why’s, Ishikawa Diagrams, etc.

Managers, supervisors and employees have daily morning huddles

Employees take extended breaks, start the shift late, end the shift early, etc.

Employees wait for their supervisors to tell them which orders to work on

Employees submit their ideas for improvement to management

Value Network Mapping

Product Mix Segmentation

Design for Flow

Part Family Formation using Routings

 

Part Family Formation using Group Technology  

 

Multi-product Manufacturing Cells

Hybrid Cellular Layout (aka Mixed Mode Facility Layout)

Shop Floor Control using Water Striders

Product Mix Rationalization

ERP with Finite Capacity Scheduling

MES (Manufacturing Execution System) for Asset Monitoring

Setup Reduction using Tooling Families

Flexible Work Instructions using Part-Process Families

Variety Reduction across Multiple Product Bills Of Materials