Lean manufacturing is a method of eliminating waste in many forms, such as materials and time, to save on business costs. In the metal industry, lean manufacturing would focus on the processing being as efficient as possible and as little metal being wasted as possible. The primary points of lean manufacturing dictate that any waste produced should be kept at a minimum. Secondly, there should be a value stream, where the whole process of the production of the product, with the suppliers and the consumer, should be one entity, and finally, requirements in the market should be connected to manufacturing.
Continuous Product Flow
Lean manufacturing touts continuous product flow. The teams and machinery are located in work cells, using a method referred to as cellular manufacturing, wherein products are made all within these cells. Each process is performed in its own cell. This system minimizes handling of materials and wait. Lean manufacturing advocates just-in-time (JIT) method for inventories. JIT eliminates inventory by only producing parts when they are required. Establishing teams that can do multiple functions and have multiple abilities is also a function of lean manufacturing. It essentially is moving away from the production line, mass-production environment.
Using Bad Times to Improve
Amid these financially difficult times, organizations should take the chance to work on improving the skills of their employees as well as their manufacturing processes including speeding up processes. A significant number lie dormant and wait for business to get better – in the end laying-off employees. Instead, they should find an opportunity and capitalize on the current situation – to visit other business’ sites and even customer’s sites to see what they are doing to become leaner or stay lean. People and businesses learn from each other. You have the opportunity to learn if there are procedural steps in a process that could be eliminated, to save your clients money and time. Look for ways to increase the quality of a product. Offer training opportunities to employees to make them feel more a part of the group.
Cost savings must be put in place but the quality of the product must be maintained. Getting ideas from employees on how to save on costs is crucial. They can establish how to reduce wastes on the materials being used to formulate a product as well as when to shut down machinery when it is not needed.
One business in the metal industry that takes a lean manufacturing stance is Maloya. Their lean method helps in them being green and also makes them more efficient. They recycle any metal not used. In 2007 they received a DOL Lean Workforce Training Grant. Maloya developed a product line of heaters. Some of the product pieces only had a “touch time” of one hour, which means it only took an hour to make, but it still took two weeks from order to shipment for product fulfillment. By using lean tools, they analyzed the situation to find out how to take out the non-value add pieces in the process that promoted delay. They also did value stream mapping and improved their value stream design. They implemented the cellular work centers and minimized material handling times through the use of shadow boards to organize employee tools. By reorganizing raw material and component staging areas they were also able to improve work flow.
Value Stream Mapping
Value Stream Mapping is an additional tool in lean manufacturing. It helps to show what is needed to get a product to a customer and how materials are flowing. The person creating the map can look for improvements in the process and analyze the material flow. Processes should be placed into three groups: waste, value add, and non-value add but needed.
Advantages of Lean
An advantage of implementing lean manufacturing in a metal fabrication environment includes waste reduction. This results in the lowering of costs to the organization. The flow of cash will be quicker and the cycles of production will become shorter. Not as many workers will be needed to perform certain chores. Inventories can be maintained at the lowest level. Equipment can be utilized at a more efficient level and utilized more often and perform more manufacturing jobs. Products will gain in quality and additionally, the quality of service toward customers will improve. Because of all of these improvements, business expansion and profits will increase due to lean manufacturing implementation.
Reto Hug is President of Maloya which specializes in complex Metal Fabrication and laser cutting technologies using highly specialized laser systems for medical, aerospace, scientific and transportation needs.