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Just-In-Time Manufacturing: JIT is a philosophy of continuous improvement in which non-value-adding activities (or wastes) are identified and removed

for the purposes of: Reducing Cost Improving Delivery Improving Quality Adding Flexibility Improving Performance Increase innovativeness

JIT is not about automation. JIT eliminates waste by providing the environment to perfect and simplify the processes. JIT is a collection of techniques used to improve operations It can also be a new production system that is used to produce goods or services. The American Production and Inventory Control Society (APICS) has the following definition of JIT: "a philosophy of manufacturing based on planned elimination of all waste and continuous improvement of productivity. It encompasses the successful execution of all manufacturing activities required to produce a final product, from design engineering to delivery and including all stages of conversion from raw material onward. The primary elements include having only the required inventory when needed; to improve quality to zero defects; to reduce lead time by reducing setup times, queue lengths and lot sizes; to incrementally revise the operations themselves; and to accomplish these things at minimum cost." When the JIT principles are implemented successfully, significant competitive advantages are realized. JIT principles can be applied to all parts of an organization: order taking, purchasing, operations, distribution, sales, accounting, design, etc. Elimination of Waste: JIT usually indentifies seven prominent types of waste to be eliminated: Waste from Overproduction Waste of waiting/idle time

Transportation Waste Processing Waste Waste from Product Defects Summary:

Inventory Waste Waste of Motion

Material related costs are reduced by reducing the number of suppliers a company deals with and developing long-term contracts through creative supplier networking, eliminating the need to count individual parts, reducing order scheduling, eliminating expediting, simplifying receiving systems, eliminating receiving inspection, eliminating most unpacking, eliminating the stocking of inventory, and eliminating excess material spoilage. Manufacturing related costs are reduced by design for manufacture and design for assembly techniques where unnecessary parts or processes are eliminated. They are also reduced through the elimination of excess material handling, inspections, and storage of parts. The primary goal is to eliminate non-value adding tasks. Quick change over techniques replace long set-up times. Cells will replace traditional assembly lines. Visual controls are often used to schedule the production of parts in place of systems such as MRP. Statistical process control is used to assure that the outcome of production is consistently met with desired results.

Requirements for JIT Manufacturing The corporate commitment to developing the internal structures and the customer and supplier bases to support JIT manufacturing is the primary requirement for developing a viable JIT system. To be able to establish a JIT manufacturing system, every department should have some commitment to align with a common goal. This goal must also be supported by the company's top management in order

to have resources and time allocated to developing the necessary systems and procedures. A significant financial commitment is necessary during the early stages of development and implementation to change over to a JIT system. This system, however, needs to be methodically developed on a scale that is within the employer's means from both a financial and an applications standpoint. Ultimately, the operation of a JIT system will require the unwavering support and commitment of the entire company. Management needs to come with grips during the early transition phase of implementing JIT. The prospect must be faced of some production loss and changes to management procedures and operation policies while existing operations and manufacturing problems are being concurrently resolved. Just-inTime will require every department in a company to contribute to the overall success of the system and patience is required as results are not instantaneous. In the long term, the rewards are worth the initial setbacks. Trust and commitment between the supplier and the customer is a must, and it is essential to keep these commitments as this is to ensure that customer's confidence in a supplier's ability to meet production schedules.

Kanban: A Card to Pull Production Toyota s Taichi Ohno introduced kanban as a tool in the development of Just In Time manufacturing. Kanban, meaning billboard or sign , is a scheduling system that pulls production based on actual demand. Kanban controls the timing and quantity, as well as the precise item to be produced. The concept came from observing the way a grocery store keeps its shelves stocked with an item:
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Customers remove items from a display shelf

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An employee notices the card left exposed by the removal of the final item The employee then goes into the storeroom and replenishes the display shelf When the bin in the storeroom is down to its reorder point, the employee who is restocking the display shelf would also order more goods from the supplier

This process works well in grocery stores and can be valuable in a manufacturing environment also. It is easy to imagine the final assembly point or final storage area for finished goods as the display shelf . As customer orders deplete the supply of finished goods, a point is reached that triggers a production order. Likewise, when a production order depletes raw material to below its trigger point, a purchase order is sent to the external supplier. Depending on the complexity of the manufacturing operation, there may be many locations for kanban cards. The same size of bolt, used in many places in the factory, might all point to one internal storage area from which the purchase order is sent to the supplier. A complex sub-assembly s kanban card might send production orders to several areas in the factory. Regardless of the complexity or the number of processing steps in a factory that pass kanban requests internally, each process should be considered a shelf awaiting a demand from its customer , the downstream process. This article covers the following:
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Introduction to Kanban cards Requirements for a Successful Kanban System Toyota s Six Kanban Practices Is Kanban Compatible with Lean Manufacturing and Production Leveling? Summary for Kanban

Introduction to Kanban Cards

The first physical implementation of kanban used actual cards such as one might see in stores. The card contains this information:
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The identity of the item that should be stocked on this shelf The reorder quantity To whom to send the order Any other information that that may be needed by the person making that order

Electronic kanban describes a computer system that triggers the orders when inventory is depleted. This performs the same function; there are trade-offs among ease of implementation, ease of change, employee training, and perhaps reliability. Depending on historic demand for an item, and the lead time required, the kanban process need not wait until the stock is entirely depleted. For example, one may decide to order when the quantity drops to 10. An obvious approach is to place the kanban card where it would be visible when the quantity in stock reaches 10. It is a simpler concept, however, if it is implemented in this fashion:
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Set the final storage bin to hold ten items; replenish it when it drops to zero Set a secondary storage bin to hold some multiple of ten items; replenish it at zero, also

So when the final storage bin requests the last ten items from the secondary bin, the secondary bin sends the order to replenish itself back to the factory or supplier. Requirements for a Successful Kanban System A kanban system requires stable and fairly level demand, varying by no more than 10% to 20% at most. Shelf life may also be a factor.

The supermarket example works well for staple goods, such as fresh vegetables, bread and rice: items which are regularly consumed and replenished. Items with seasonal demand, such as Valentine chocolates, Easter eggs, or Christmas fruit cakes would not be re-stocked immediately after that event. Instead, shelf space is made available for the next seasonal item. In contrast, the supply chain for frozen turkey may continue operating all year, even if the seasonal demand peaks for Thanksgiving and Christmas. When raising poultry, production is hard to manipulate, but freezing and warehousing is relatively straightforward. If too little inventory is available to meet demand, or the manufacturing or supply processes run slower than required, the external customer will experience a delay. This business risk must be managed against the beneficial cost reduction of carrying less inventory than before kanban was introduced. A company with a diversified product line may have naturally balanced or unbalanced demand. Lawn mowers and snow blowers, for example, are required in different seasons, so there is a natural balance. A kanban system is unlikely to try to restock both products simultaneously. However, if all of the company s products rise and fall in demand simultaneously, kanban will result in conflicts. An example would be a company that manufactures small motors for lawn mowers and other warm weather consumer products. Toyota s Six Kanban Practices Toyota implemented six important practices to enable kanban to serve its needs:
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Never send defective products downstream to the next process Each process only orders what it currently needs from the upstream process Each process only produces the quantity ordered by the downstream process

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Maintain a level rate of production Use kanban to fine-tune the rate of production Work to reach a stable rate of production

Production leveling is a separate topic, and may be difficult to achieve; that may be why the final three practices refer to it. To over-simplify, level production means that each process works at a steady pace rather than racing in reaction to crises, with idle periods between orders. Lean manufacturing tries to avoid having inventory, which is seen as a waste of cash, storage space and the motion required to store and retrieve items. Is Kanban Compatible with Lean Manufacturing and Production Leveling? It may be better to say that it is possible to arrive at a rational compromise, depending on the mix of products demanded by external customers. An absolutely Lean factory never stops moving material as it moves from the loading dock as raw material, through internal steps as goods-in-process, and onto the truck from the shipping dock. No inventory is kept anywhere. If external customers always buy in economic order quantities with flexible deadlines, suppliers are always reliable, and processing time is minimal, then a Lean factory will maintain level production for each order and does not need kanban. If the external customers buy in variable quantities and orders may pile up, it becomes necessary to deliberately pursue production leveling. This keeps equipment and personnel operating at a steady and sustainable pace while producing fewer defects than would be created in a mad rush. To avoid missing customer deadlines, however, requires a minimal inventory of finished goods to cover peak demand. Once one accepts the need for the minimal inventory of finished goods to cover peak demand , then kanbanbecomes an excellent way to trigger the production cycle. The quantities noted on the kanban cards reflects the compromise between

the Lean goal of zero inventory and the conflicting demands to satisfy varying demands from external customers. On the assumption that the factory is building different products simultaneously, kanban can also serve the goal of production levelling, or heijuka. This was first implemented using the heijuka box, a pigeonhole mailbox. Each product that a machine or process can make has a horizontal row in the box. Vertical columns correspond to work shifts. As kanban order cards are brought to that machine, the cards are placed in the correct row for the product they represent. By distributing the cards along the row, the orders are assigned to subsequent shifts. Each shift should have a selection of cards that achieves the goal of level production. Electronic versions of kanban and heijuka are available, but the cards provide a relatively easy implementation and certainly serve as tools for training. Summary A kanban system requires a fairly level and well-understood demand, as well as careful analysis of the capabilities of the manufacturing process. A well-researched and well-implemented kanban system is capable of delivering cost savings by reducing inventory, warehousing and deferring manufacturing expenses until production is required. Oskar Olofsson, 2011

Lean manufacturing concepts Lean manufacturing concepts were developed over the last five to six decades, primarily in Japan, particularly for the Toyota production system. These concepts met various tests for many many years and passed the test of time very easily.

Lean manufacturing revolutionaries the manufacturing process. It was not a fine tuning of the existing manufacturing processes. These manufacturing techniques are conceptually different from the traditional process. For an example, traditional manufacturing works based on inventory. But lean manufacturing questions the role of inventory and defines as a waste it self and also as the reflector of the imperfections a system has. This example, itself shows the conceptual deference between the traditional manufacturing system and lean manufacturing system. Sometimes it is very hard to believe that a system like lean manufacturing was born with a simple set of concepts. But it is true. Principle on which lean manufacturing operates is very simple. For an example it identifies the fact that customer will not pay for the mistakes, but only for the value of the product or the service they receive . The impact on this thinking is huge on the manufacturing process. It changed the way people looked at the manufacturing process. It made people to define value of the product from the customer s point of view, not from the internal manufacturing point of view. To successfully implement lean manufacturing, it is necessary to understand the differences between the lean manufacturing concepts to the conventional manufacturing. Failing to do this, will eventually kill your success.

Toyota Production System


A production system which is steeped in the philosophy of "the complete elimination of all waste" imbuing all aspects of production in pursuit of the most efficient methods.
Toyota Motor Corporation's vehicle production system is a way of "making things" that is sometimes referred to as a "lean manufacturing system" or a "Just-in-Time (JIT) system," and has come to be well known and studied worldwide.

This production control system has been established based on many years of continuous improvements, with the objective of "making the vehicles ordered by customers in the quickest and most efficient way, in order to deliver the vehicles as quickly as possible." The Toyota Production System (TPS) was established based on two concepts: The first is called "jidoka" (which can be loosely translated as "automation with a human touch") which means that when a problem occurs, the equipment stops immediately, preventing defective products from being produced; The second is the concept of "Just-in-Time," in which each process produces only what is needed by the next process in a continuous flow. Based on the basic philosophies of jidoka and Just-in-Time, the TPS can efficiently and quickly produce vehicles of sound quality, one at a time, that fully satisfy customer requirements.

TPS Concept

Jidoka Highlighting/visualization of problems


-Quality must be built in during the manufacturing process!If equipment malfunction or a defective part is discovered, the affected machine automatically stops, and operators cease production and correct the problem. For the Just-in-Time system to function, all of the parts that are made and supplied must meet predetermined quality standards. This is achieved through jidoka. 1. Jidoka means that a machine safely stops when the normal processing is completed. It also means that, should a quality / equipment problem arise, the machine detects the problem on its own and stops, preventing defective products from being produced. As a result, only products satisfying quality standards will be passed on to the following processes on the production line. 2. Since a machine automatically stops when processing is completed or when a problem arises and is communicated via the "andon" (problem display board), operators can confidently continue performing work at another machine, as well as easily identify the problem's cause to prevent its recurrence. This means that each operator can be in charge of many machines, resulting in higher

Just-in-Time Productivity improvement


- Making only "what is needed, when it is needed, and in the amount needed!" Producing quality products efficiently through the complete elimination of waste, inconsistencies, and unreasonable requirements on the production line. In order to deliver a vehicle ordered by a customer as quickly as possible, the vehicle is efficiently built within the shortest possible period of time by adhering to the following: 1. When a vehicle order is received, a production instruction must be issued to the beginning of the vehicle production line as soon as possible. 2. The assembly line must be stocked with required number of all needed parts so that any type of ordered vehicle can be assembled. 3. The assembly line must replace the parts used by retrieving the same number of parts from the parts-producing process (the preceding process). 4. The preceding process must be stocked with small numbers of all types of parts and produce only the numbers of parts that were retrieved by an operator from

productivity, while continuous improvements lead to greater processing capacity.

the next process.

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