Productivity Improvement of An Assembly Line using MOST and Heuristic

Abstract

In present global scenario where time and cost have become synonymous with one another, it is important improve the overall performance of the industry. Heavy industries such as automobile industries invest a lot of time and money in establishing manufacturing facilities which demands effective utilization of resources to save time and money. This research is an attempt in an assembly line to analyze and expose the effect of sequencing based on the takt time and its impact over the performance of the line. Initial study involves monitoring and standardization of process time for all operations using Maynard Operation Sequencing Technique. Work is further extended to the concept of sequencing and simulation. Calculated process time are used to sequence the operations based on standard Priority Dispatching Rules such as Longest Processing Time, Shortest Processing Time, Potential Score Method, Followers Based Ranking and a custom developed model based on takt time. Discrete Event Simulation of the assembly line was run for all these sequences and it was found that the model developed based on takt time fetched the best results. The model also showed the maximum utilization, line efficiency among all models and had a much better smoothness index than other models.