Manufacturing Point Of View Research Articles

Green Procurement Decisions with Carbon Leakage by Global Suppliers and Order Quantities under Different Carbon Tax

Manufactures have been pressed to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by environmental regulations and policies. Towards to reduction of GHG emissions, a carbon tax has been already introduced in 40 countries. Owing to different carbon prices among countries, there are potential risks of carbon leakage, where manufacturers transfer production operations to the countries with lower taxes to pursue lower costs. Moreover, procurement costs and GHG emissions vary by country because of economic conditions and electric energy mixes. Therefore, total GHG emissions could be globally reduced if manufactures relocate their production bases or switch suppliers in the country with lower GHG emission levels. This study proposes a green procurement decision for the supplier selection and the order quantity for minimizing GHG emission and costs considering the different carbon taxes in different countries. First, a bill of materials for each part is constructed through the life cycle inventory database with the Asian international input/output tables for a case study. Second, a green procurement decision considering the different carbon prices is formulated using integer programming. Finally, the results, including carbon leakage, are analyzed from the viewpoint of manufacturers, governments, and global perspectives.

Energy considerations for the economic production quantity and the joint economic lot sizing

The increased awareness on sustainability, along with several governments’ actions for setting greenhouse gas restrictions, has recently generated a relevant pressure on industries towards the improvement of environmental performances. Among the several aspects, companies’ focus is mainly on energy use, firstly for its relevant and direct impact on the total cost, and secondly for its environmental linkage. The aim of this contribution is the integration of the energy-related objectives in lot sizing, extending the economic production quantity from the manufacturer point of view and extending the joint economic lot size model from the single-vendor single-buyer supply chain perspective, so as to show how this approach can lead to a more sustainable production process. The present work proposes a novel framework for dimensioning production lot sizes, based on both economic and energy implications in processes characterized by a variable production rate. Furthermore, an increased attention for the sustainability of the production–inventory system is introduced by considering energy as a key factor in the lot sizing problem, due to the close link between energy and environmental concerns. A traditional agreement and a vendor managed inventory with consignment stock for the joint economic lot sizing have been investigated explicitly formulating energy in production aspects. A numerical example is also presented to compare the behaviour of the models.

Effect of random roundness error on the stability of a hydrodynamic journal bearing system part I: Theoretical study

From a manufacturing viewpoint, the profile of a journal out-of-roundness is random. In order to be closer to the engineering practice, the study presents a dynamic modelling, analysis and calculat...

Parallelism between risk and perception of risk among caregivers during anesthesia delivery.

The paper examines the different perceptions of risk associated with anesthesia systems from the viewpoint of the product manufacturer and the caregiver. Only a little research has been done with regard to the impact of perception of risk on patient safety in anesthesia. The role of the manufacturer in mitigating the perception of risk will be central for the work. The risk will be examined as the probability of negative occurrences based on the Medical Device Reportable (MDR) events for 2016 and 2017 and it will be examined how the caregiver perceives and manages these risks when delivering anesthesia. Analysis of the manufacturer's public Medical Device Reportable events data will be performed in the US market and will represent the actual risk achieved; this review will provide a perspective on how the risk is perceived and managed by the caregiver when delivering anesthesia. The goals of the paper are to highlight how the role of the manufacturers can have an impact on the reduction of perception of risk, increasing patient safety, and showing how the perception of risk is usually magnified by the hospital personnel.

The Manufacturer's Viewpoint

The Manufacturer's Viewpoint

Contact Lens Materials: A Materials Science Perspective.

More is demanded from ophthalmic treatments using contact lenses, which are currently used by over 125 million people around the world. Improving the material of contact lenses (CLs) is a now rapidly evolving discipline. These materials are developing alongside the advances made in related biomaterials for applications such as drug delivery. Contact lens materials are typically based on polymer- or silicone-hydrogel, with additional manufacturing technologies employed to produce the final lens. These processes are simply not enough to meet the increasing demands from CLs and the ever-increasing number of contact lens (CL) users. This review provides an advanced perspective on contact lens materials, with an emphasis on materials science employed in developing new CLs. The future trends for CL materials are to graft, incapsulate, or modify the classic CL material structure to provide new or improved functionality. In this paper, we discuss some of the fundamental material properties, present an outlook from related emerging biomaterials, and provide viewpoints of precision manufacturing in CL development.

Effect of weld line direction and paint orientation on corrosion and paint deterioration characteristics of welded part of steel

ABSTRACTOne thousand two hundred cycles of accelerated exposure experiment with combined salt water spray simulating atmospheric corrosion was performed for investigating the effect of weld line direction and paint orientation on the corrosion and paint deterioration characteristics of welded part of the steel. The corrosion depth of the weld toe of transverse weld line became 1.35 times as large as that of the base metal part because of the remained salt water on the weld toe. The coating thickness at the weld toe became thin by vertically painting on the transverse weld line. When the scribe line was installed at the thin painted weld toe under the transverse weld line, the paint blister area became 15% larger than that of the base metal part. The paint coating thickness at the weld toe in different weld line directions and paint orientations should be confirmed and ensured from the viewpoints of manufacturing and maintaining steel structures.

Post-warranty maintenance optimization for products with deterioration depending on aging and shock

ABSTRACTDue to the non-substitutability of the product, the monopoly manufacturer designs warranty to reduce maximally warranty cost. Although the monopoly manufacturer maintains responsibly product reliability in warranty, the consumer still confronts a problem about how to sustain product reliability after the designed warranty expires. Goal of this paper is, from the consumer’s perspective, to propose a reliability maintenance policy after expiry of the monopoly manufacturer’s warranty. First, a renewable repair-limit pro-rata replacement warranty (RRLPRRW) policy is considered from viewpoint of the monopoly manufacturer and used as a quality guarantee of the product with the deterioration affected by internal aging and external shock. Second, depreciation cost is earlier considered in the process of modeling life cycle cost, which differs from the traditional works on the consumer’s post-warranty reliability maintenance problem. Third, the consumer’s discounted cost rate model considering depreciation cost is derived to achieve optimal maintenance policy. Finally, a numerical example is provided to illustrate our approach. It was found that the proposed maintenance policy is more effective and the depreciation cost considered in life cycle cost has significant effect on extension of the post-warranty period.

Design Process to Reduce Production Cycle Time in Product Development

<span lang="EN-US">In today’s business climate, the old adage “time is money” has been expanded to mean that time is competitive weapon. Today customer’s demands are quick delivery and good quality at reasonable price. When entering the global market the companies encounter several difficulties, the most important one being excessive time for new product development. Thus to perform in a global market, short lead times are essential to provide customer satisfaction. Lead time in manufacturer point of view is the time elapse between placing of an order and the receipt of goods ordered. There are various components of lead time such as setup time, process time, move time and waiting time. This paper deals with review of various tools and techniques to reduce lead time. This problem can be solved by transition from sequential engineering to concurrent engineering, A survey of published works in the field of designing teams in big companies has revealed that in big companies a three-level team structure is recommended, as well as a workgroup, consisting of four basic teams. Method study techniques use to examine current way of work and develop effective method base on elimination, combining, changing and simplification of activities. Various lean tools such as Single Minute Exchange of Dies (SMED), 5S, Poka-yoke, Kanban, Just-in-time (JIT), Value Stream Mapping (VSM), Jidoka, Cellular manufacturing etc. helps in reducing lead time. Also Manufacturing Resource Planning (MRPII), Theory of Constraints (TOC) classic approaches of Production Planning and Control (PPC) are use to reduce Work in Process (WIP) and flow time.</span>

PH and Buffer Capacity of Topical Formulations.

The pH is an important physicochemical factor that plays a significant role in various metabolic, molecular and cell-regulating processes. In the epidermis, the pH affects the barrier function on different levels. In many dermatoses that come along with an impaired barrier, shifts in the pH can be observed, and this is a problem that definitely needs to be addressed by finding appropriate galenic formulas when prescribing barrier protective basic care. With this in mind, 66 cosmetic preparations have been chosen following German market analysis. These preparations have been investigated regarding phase relation of the emulsion, absolute pH value and buffer capacity. The results show that only 23 preparations have an appropriate pH of ≤5.5 and only 3 preparations show a buffer capacity of ≥1.0. This outcome demonstrates the fact that the significance of pH and buffer capacity as quality criteria for barrier-protective preparations is still highly underrated from the view point of manufacturers and users.

Adoption of JMM practices – A key to performance improvement of a local automotive industry

It is imperative for a manufacturing company all over the world to constantly look for ways to increase productivity and at the same time to lower cost to secure a competitive position. It is recognized that practices associated with Japanese Manufacturing Management (JMM) can yield a superior competitive advantage in terms of productivity, quality and provide overall successful business performance. This paper discusses the transfer of the best practices of the JMM locally and analyses the impact of adoption and adaptation of the management system as an in-depth case study conducted in a Malaysian automotive company. This study is to identify what are the changes in terms of the philosophy and practices undertaken by the company and ascertain the impact of the JMM on its manufacturing and financial performances. The elements of business performance from the viewpoint of manufacturing are based on safety, Parts Per Million (PPM), in-line Defect per Unit (DPU), First Time Quality (FTQ), cycle time, productivity, efficiency and stock level. The results show a positive impact to the automotive plant manufacturing performance. For example, safety index has reduced to 0 major accident occurrences. The PPM and In-line DPU have improved by 98% and 91% respectively whereas the FTQ has improved by 167%. Cycle time has reduced from 20 to 6 minutes and productivity increased up to 43% whilst the efficiency reached at 99.9%. The stock level was reduced from half month to 3 days after the adoption of the JMM. The revenue has increased up to 92%, the percentage of expenses has reduced from 11.04% to 3.06% giving an improvement of 72% whilst the net profit has increased from 5.33% to 8.15%. The Return of Asset (RoA) and Return of Equity (RoE) also showed slight improvement despite the effects from the restructuring exercise, Tsunami calamity and fluctuation in Japanese exchange rate.

Can Human Embryonic Stem Cell-Derived Stromal Cells Serve a Starting Material for Myoblasts?

A large number of myocytes are necessary to treat intractable muscular disorders such as Duchenne muscular dystrophy with cell-based therapies. However, starting materials for cellular therapy products such as myoblasts, marrow stromal cells, menstrual blood-derived cells, and placenta-derived cells have a limited lifespan and cease to proliferate in vitro. From the viewpoints of manufacturing and quality control, cells with a long lifespan are more suitable as a starting material. In this study, we generated stromal cells for future myoblast therapy from a working cell bank of human embryonic stem cells (ESCs). The ESC-derived CD105+ cells with extensive in vitro proliferation capability exhibited myogenesis and genetic stability in vitro. These results imply that ESC-derived CD105+ cells are another cell source for myoblasts in cell-based therapy for patients with genetic muscular disorders. Since ESCs are immortal, mesenchymal stromal cells generated from ESCs can be manufactured at a large scale in one lot for pharmaceutical purposes.

Impact of hard and soft TQM on supply chain performance: empirical investigation of pharmaceutical industry

This study identified the two forms of total quality management (TQM) practices 'soft' and 'hard'. The study further investigated the impact of soft TQM practices on hard TQM practices and their impact on plant level supply chain in pharmaceutical setup. The present study provides some meaningful implications to practicing managers, which are critical from pharmaceutical manufacturing point of view. In pharmaceutical manufacturing, employees may require more training and development as market is regulated by major drug administrations from abroad as well as domestic and top management support may help to achieve it. Research and development and to maintain the sustainable quality of products along with productive maintenance over a period of time results in supply chain performance. Soft TQM practices directly impact the supply chain performance, but hard TQM practices impact greatly supply chain performance as comparison to soft TQM. Soft TQM practices impact supply chain performance via hard TQM practices significantly.

Edge-functionalized acetylene black anchoring sulfur for high-performance Li–S batteries

To date, most of the research on electrodes for lithium sulfur batteries has been focused on the nanostructured sulfur cathodes and achieves significant success. However, from the viewpoint of manufacturers, the nanostructured sulfur cathodes are not so promising, because of the low volumetric energy density and high cost. In this work, we obtained the low-cost, scalable, eco-friendly mass production of edge-functionalized acetylene black-sulfur (FAB-S) composites by high-energy ball-milling technique for lithium sulfur batteries. The as-prepared FAB-S composite can deliver a high initial discharge capacity of 1304mAh/g and still remain a reversible capacity of 814mAh/g after 200 cycles at a charge-discharge rate of 0.2C in the voltage range of 1.7–2.7V. The observed excellent electrochemical properties demonstrate that the cathodes obtained by the facile high-energy ball-milling method as the cathode for rechargeable Li−S batteries are of great potential because it used the sole conductive additive acetylene black (AB). Such improved properties could be attributed to the partially exfoliation of AB, which not only keeps the AB's inherent advantage, but also increases the specific surface area and forms chemical bonds between carbon and sulfur, resulting in the accumulation of the polysulfides intermediate through both the physical and chemical routes.

Fish Hydrolysates: A Regulatory Perspective of Bioactive Peptides.

For the first time introduced on the Japanese market, bioactive fish hydrolysates are now available all over the world as food supplements, functional food ingredients or nutricosmeceuticals. They are generally produced from low value fish waste, an almost inexhaustible source of raw material, and are sold as high value products, making them economically interesting from a manufacturer's view point. Most of these products have health or structure/function claims on their packages with different actions like antihypertensive, blood-glucose lowering, anxiolytic, and skin anti-aging activities. Although the different regional legislations all aim to assure consumer safety and prevent misleading of the consumer, the number of legally approved fish hydrolysate containing products drastically differs among different regions. This is because products that have been positively evaluated based on safety and efficacy in one region were found to have not enough evidence for efficacy in another region. These findings call for further international harmonization of the regulation and classification of these products. Moreover, interaction studies of these bioactive products with the normal diet or medicines are generally not performed, keeping the consumer uninformed of the possible risks of combining these products with medicinal products or other food ingredients.

Strategies for Developing Milling Tools from the Viewpoint of Sustainable Manufacturing

This study addresses the strategies for developing the cutting tools used in the material removal process called milling from the viewpoint of sustainable manufacturing. Sustainable manufacturing can be achieved by improving the material, energy, and component efficiencies, simultaneously. Cutting tools are just as important as machine tools and process planning to the achievement of the abovementioned efficiencies. Accordingly, this study describes two strategies based on high cutting velocity and feed per revolution, respectively. Exercising the strategy of high cutting velocity requires a Monte Carlo simulation-driven optimization technique. It helps make a balance between the tool material driven environmental burden and the user-defined maximum allowable cutting velocity. Exercising the strategy of high feed per revolution requires an innovative problem-solving procedure (e.g., TRIZ). It helps create novel solutions (e.g., an oval-shaped milling tool) that eliminate the causes of unstable cutting forces or vibrations when the tool passes over sharp corners. Thus, this study clearly shows that developing a milling tool from the viewpoint of sustainable manufacturing requires a multi-faceted approach. Similar strategies can be used to solve the problems involved in developing other cutting tools.

건설기계의 에너지 효율 제고를 위한 비-하이브리드 신기술에 관한 리뷰

New non-hybrid approaches to improve energy efficiency of construction machineries are reviewed in this paper. Hydraulic systems are classified into four classes according to Backe's classification and commercially promising new technologies are carefully chosen in each class. IMV, 3-Line CPR, Closed Circuit Displacement Control of Differential Cylinder, and Throttle-less Secondary Control are chosen as representative non-hybrid new technologies. Key principle of each technology is explained and representative references which run through each technology are selected. Advantages and weaknesses of each technology are discussed and compared from the view point of construction machinery manufacturers.

A Bayesian negotiation model for quality and price in a multi-consumer context

Bayesian decision theory plays a significant role in a large number of applications that have as main aim decision making. At the same time, negotiation is a process of making joint decisions that has one of its main foundations in decision theory. In this context, an important issue involved in industrial and commercial applications is product reliability/quality demonstration. The goal is, among others, product commercialization with the best possible price. This paper provides a Bayesian sequential negotiation model in the context of sale of a product based on two characteristics: product price and reliability/quality testing. The model assumes several parties, a manufacturer and different consumers, who could be considered adversaries. In addition, a general setting for which the manufacturer offers a product batch to the consumers is taken. Both the manufacturer and the consumers have to use their prior beliefs as well as their preferences. Sometimes, the model will require to update the previous beliefs. This can be made through the corresponding posterior distribution. Anyway, the main aim is that at least one consumer accepts the product batch based on either product price or product price and reliability/quality. The general model is solved from the manufacturer viewpoint. Thus a general approach that allows us to calculate an optimal price and sample size for testing is provided. Finally, two applications show how the proposed technique can be applied in practice.

A Novel Electromagnetic Actuator Based on Displacement Amplification Mechanism

This paper introduces a new type of linear actuator using the electromagnetic attractive force, which enables a submillimeter stroke. In general, actuation by the electromagnetic attractive force causes a tradeoff problem between the thrust force and the stroke because the thrust force depends on the gap between the electromagnet and the armature; an increase in the gap (stroke) drastically degrades the thrust force. To realize a submillimeter stroke while retaining a high thrust force, a structure that adopts a displacement amplification mechanism is proposed, which is often used to expand the stroke of a piezoelectric actuator. First, the electromagnetic attractive force is theoretically examined with and without displacement amplification. We verify that displacement amplification could create a higher thrust force and energy efficiency over a certain displacement. On the basis of this examination, a prototype actuator is designed, and the driving principle is illustrated. Further, an analytical model of the proposed actuator is developed for control and performance estimation. Several fundamental experiments with a developed actuator are performed in order to reveal the potential of the proposed actuator. The performance evaluations show that the maximum stroke is approximately 450 μm and a bandwidth greater than 300 Hz can be realized, and more a time constant is approximately 2 ms for a stroke of 450 μm. In addition, the experimental results were compared with the simulation results calculated from the analytical model to verify whether the prototype drives predictably according to the proposed concept under a dynamic situation. These results demonstrate that the proposed actuator enables good actuation performance, and it implies that there are tremendous advantages from the viewpoints of manufacturing, assembly, control, etc.

Direct digital manufacturing: definition, evolution, and sustainability implications

One of the hot topics currently in manufacturing domain is direct digital manufacturing. With introduction of cheap three-dimensional printers, the direct digital manufacturing seems to become a new manufacturing paradigm with an entirely different impact on society; nevertheless how this will impact the society and the differences between the paradigms are unclear. According to this background, this paper presents a comprehensive analysis of direct digital manufacturing from different perspectives in comparison to various traditional manufacturing paradigms. Authors are using a societal viewpoint to see, describe and analyse the subject instead of traditional manufacturing viewpoint. For the better understanding of direct digital manufacturing origins, a classification and historical background about available techniques are described. Furthermore, direct digital manufacturing as a paradigm is analysed and compared with craft production, mass production and mass customisation. Direct digital manufacturing's sustainability aspects related to social, economical and environmental dimensions are gathered and analysed for a better insight of this technique. A detailed case study demonstrates the energy use differences of direct digital manufacturing and mass production in depth. According to the present work, direct digital manufacturing has the possibility of combining the advantages of the other production paradigms and can have a positive impact on sustainable development; yet, there are several challenges to overcome both in technical and sociality aspects. A challenge within the social aspects can be the life style changes which can impact the job market, working environment, waste management and more.