Abstract
Companies have to assure their share on the global market, meet customer demands and produce customer-tailored products. With time and production line updates, the layout becomes non-optimal and product diversity only increases this problem. To stay competitive, they need to increase their productivity and eliminate waste. Due to a variety of products consisting of similar components and variants thereof, a huge number of various elements are encountered in a production process, the material flow of which is hardly manageable. Although the elements differ from each other, their representative elements can be defined. This paper will illustrate a methodology for searching representative elements (MIRE), which is a combination of the known Pareto’s analysis (also known as ABC analysis or 20/80 rule) and a calculation of a loading function, that can be based on any element feature. Results of using the MIRE methodology in a case from an industrial environment have shown that the analysis can be carried out within a very short time and this provides for permanent analysis, optimisation and, consequently, permanent improvement in the material flow through a production process. The methodology is most suitable for smaller companies as it enables rapid analysis, especially in cases when there is no pre-recorded material flow.
Highlights
Lean production as a production strategy is one of important paradigms of the 21st century which has been introduced in various variants practically in all companies in the world
Analyses [1] have shown that merely 20% of activities in a production process directly add added value, 20% of activities do not directly give any added value, but are needed in order to carry out activities that add added value, while the rest (60%) are the activities which do not add added value and are, indicated as waste
If a technological operation is observed as a fundamental element of a lead time for the production of a component, it is determined that the lead time of an operation consists of: (1) transition time calculated as completion of the preceding operation until the beginning of performance of the observed operation; it represents as much as 90% of the time in the structure of the lead time of an operation, and
Summary
Lean production as a production strategy is one of important paradigms of the 21st century which has been introduced in various variants practically in all companies in the world. A lean environment can minimise waste by elimination, merging or simplification of technologically unnecessary operations (stock, transport) and unnecessary elements of the work process (auxiliary and extra activities), that do not give any added value. Analyses [1] have shown that merely 20% of activities in a production process directly add added value, 20% of activities do not directly give any added value, but are needed in order to carry out activities that add added value, while the rest (60%) are the activities which do not add added value and are, indicated as waste.
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