Author Archives: george

Design for Service

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notINservice
We have all gotten excited by the 5S shine concept until we got out into the plant and tried to accomplish it at a reasonable cost. This is when it becomes evident if the manufacturing cell was set up with service in mind. In my career it has been necessary retrofit serviceability into a few plants that were not profitable because they had excessive down time. I would like to claim that I reinvented the equipment so that it never broke, but the technology to accomplish that approach is still way in the future. What I could do is speed up the process for repairing the equipment when it did break. This task would be easy if it only involved changing one item. The reality is that serviceablity is doing a whole bunch of little things right.
I have chosen to highlight a some examples that I recently implemented on a 3500 Ton Prince Die Cast cell at Cana-datum.

3500 ton Prince Sample Die Casting Cell

3500 ton Prince Sample
Die Casting Cell


1) Captivated bolts on guards – A surprising amount of machine repair time is lost simply looking for the bolts to reassemble after a repair. I discovered that washers welded to the bolts kept them from getting dropped and lost.
2) Hook on guards. I only use one bolt to attach my guards to the machine so that I conform to the safety standard for bolted guard. I turned around a plant loosing millions per year by changing guards
with 20 or so bolts into hook on guards with a single bolt.
3) Maximized crane drop in access by routing utilities in banks.
4) No utilities below floor level
5) Platform without leg bracing bolted at deck level instead of concrete floor anchored
6) Modularized platforms, auxiliary equipment – The items surrounding the main equipment can be quickly removed because they are in manageable chunks that can be moved with a lift truck.
7) Sweepable floor. Everything is off of the floor or contained with closed bases so that floor dry can be quickly removed when the spills occur.
8) All electrical junction box covers accessible without disassembly

Mimicry

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By Charles R Knight

By Charles R Knight


We are all being asked to innovate to insure the long term viability of our firms. Nature serves as a good model because evolution serves to highlight the best strategies. Modern behemoths like the 3500 Prince Die Casting machine at Cana-datum are a good example. Innovation, useful in the current marketplace, involves adding computer brain power to improve control and results. In the same fashion that the brontosaurus used multiple brains to achieve timely control, die casting machines work best when more than one computer is employed. In the same fashion that involuntary nerve reactions protect us from injury, some of the innovative new computer uses are simply mundane monitors. Higher level computer brain power can be dedicated to running the shot in much the same fashion as the brontosaurus had a whole brain dedicated to operating the rear legs. Computers embedded in devices like soft starter are particularly useful is reducing the peak electrical demand so that enough power is available to implement precision temperature control using hot oil systems without rewiring the plant.

Future Shock

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Cashflow for Manufacturing cell with Illya Dobrych Lightning background

Cashflow for Manufacturing cell with Illya Dobrych Lightning background


Will Rogers once quipped that it is easy to make money on the stock market. His observation also can be applied to investing in manufacturing. You buy equipment and you make a profit when the manufactured product sells. Some asked “What do you do if the product doesn’t sell?” — Future Shock Applies — Will Rogers responded “That is easy too – you don’t buy the equipment” My lead picture displays a typical manufacturing investment cash flow. In automotive especially because “production process” parts for testing are wanted well ahead of volume manufacturing, investment in equipment can be required two years ahead. In the current chaos, it is easy for the demand for a specific part to evaporate before the volume production starts.
Anyone who rolls the dice by investing in manufacturing is well aware of future shock. The real question is what do you do to reduce the risk? Designers on my projects, who succeed in mitigating future shock risk receive a plaque with a shoe horn. A shoe horn is an uncommonly used engineering design tool.
GM integrated Axel I-6 oil pan

GM integrated Axel I-6 oil pan

The patent and best in industry awards for a GM engine component are just gingerbread when they are compared with the creative design that enable us to delay the build of the plant and purchase of the equipment for a couple years until volume production started. One of my shoe horn plaques is in the lobby of the tool and die shop who managed to squeeze the design of the tooling into existing production equipment enabling the creating of early production samples
As we all recover from the recession against a background of chaos, it will become necessary to mitigate this type of future shock in most new manufacturing launches. I have spent the last year of my life installing a $5,000,000 manufacturing cell at a tool and die shop.Shazaam1
Our first user solved their timing and interest cost issues manufacturing their “production process” test parts at the tool and die shop. This saved them one years interest cost on their own production cell which will not be in place till this fall. The extra lean cost benefits of faster launch timing, early process development and tooling correction shipping are just extra icing on the cake.

Lean for the Masses

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Gutenberg invents the printing press

Gutenberg invents the printing press

The printing press ushered in the first “lean” revolution. No longer did the cost of hand copying books limit the number of copies that could be created. Sage wisdom could be purchased by individuals of average means. This knowledge transfer explosion set the stage for the conversion of a feudal society into the current industrial age. Many years later I arrived as an aspiring engineer. I could purchase 20 text books and obtain the accumulated knowledge of the giants in the engineering field. Even though these books were very expensive, they were worth every penny. Top educators were highly rewarded in royalties and higher education stature based on their ability to distill the knowledge that a young engineer would need to begin his trade.
text books

text books


Enter the computer revolution. Globe spanning telecommunications, bring vast quantities of information to our door. A few individuals have discovered ways to leverage this advancement into serious income. The cash flow has also attracted modern day pirates that apply their effort into gaming the system. Many of the innovators have reacted to pirate attacks by innovating further. The rest of us just see chaos.
This will settle out. While I was in college a new generation of calculator came out about every 6 months. We all progressed from a simple floating point machine to a full
scientific calculator. The interesting point is the process stopped. My current calculator is as powerful as the one I had leaving college. As a more recent example Open Office as a commodity software has heralded the maturing of the Microsoft office suite.
The recent advancements in 16mm low power processors will open the door to combining
memory and computing power onto a single stick. This advancement will close a popular
door used by pirates and enable the monetization of the effort required to create custom lean applications. I suspect that some of the recent wealth gap increase is related to the lack of a secure vehicle for the people who have discovered new lean wealth creating methods to sell that knowledge to the masses
Combined Computer and Memory stick

Combined Computer and Memory stick

Embedded Lean

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NOfat
Lean automation applies to all aspects of business. With the cost of computing declining as predicted by Moore’s law, we can now afford to multiply the talents
of a few excellent lean practitioners across a wider audience. This trend is matches the activity occurring in higher education where online courses are now becoming the norm. The modern computerized telecommunication miracle is leveraging the talents of the best educators across the world education system.
The secret is providing lean information at the time that it is needed. We could care less about the avalanche of medical knowledge but are extremely interested in the
specific tid bits that apply to our current malady. Blood pressure cuffs that know exactly how to automatically take a reading are a good example of embedding the skill of nurses
as an automated computerized embedded lean device.
Manufacturing has evolved from plants making a few million identical Chevy Caprices
to customized JIT manufacturing on demand. This mass customization would not be
possible without the computerized ERP, TMS and work instruction systems that provide the correct information as it is needed.
The simplest tasks sometimes have the biggest payback. It takes next to no effort to flip a light switch. Most of us have the skill to perform this task from the time we are two years old. A major cost saving is possible by implementing computerized sensors that simply turn off the light when the room is unoccupied.
Technology needs to be the servant and not the master. An “app” for your smart phone that routes you around unseen traffic tie ups saves major time in your life schedule and controls wasted fuel. Plugged into my car is a Mileage Trakker http://mileagetrakker.com that creates an IRS mileage report at tax time without me remembering to turn it on. On the opposite hand, I was talking with one of my truckers who indicated that he chose to move to another sector of the trucking industry because his former employer implemented a computerized ball and chain that rigidly enforced perfect compliance to inflexible rules.
Our lives will be better after we learn to apply the lean benefits of lower cost computing.

Wingman

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Who is watching your back?

Who is watching your back?

In this high tech world it is comforting to know that you have angels looking over your shoulder. For example you have a computer wingman driving with you every mile of the way.  You won’t believe me until you try to drive a Model T where the spark advance is controlled by the driver using a lever attached to the steering wheel.  It is very easy to stall the engine each and every shift by getting the spark advance wrong.  Technology done right, like computer controlled spark advance, is user invisible.

 

Ford Model T opened driving to the masses

Ford Model T opened driving to the masses

We all get frustrated with new technology that requires the skill of a rocket scientist to operate.  Robotic and CNC manufacturing machinery that was introduced in the 90’s fit in that category.  The computer processor in that equipment was barely able to keep up with running the equipment and did not have any leftover capacity to assist the user.  The good news is that we can now afford lots of computer capacity as Moore’s law predicted.   Multiple large capacity computers are embedded into just about everything we currently create.

The secret is in creating useful tasks for these computers to do.  A computerized “wingman”,  who bridges the gap between the bits and byte and the user is one of the most helpful tasks.  I work with Wesley an industrial vehicle builder who offers an autonomous tug vehicle.  This technology would not have the market interest or acceptance if it required a rocket scientist to purpose it for the task. The embedded “wingman” in the computer control enables a normal warehouse worker to program a delivery,  simply by driving the route it the first time.  Other good examples of invisible computerized “wingmen” include the Milage Trakker http://mileagetrakker.com plugged into my car that collects and tabulates the mileage that I drive without me having to think about it.  It also understands and interprets the engine error codes with information provided real time to my smart phone.

I am not sure that I pictured the angel looking over my shoulder as a R2-D2 robot.  As computers invade every aspect of our lives I am beginning to believe that this is exactly what I need.

New and Shiney

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diamond-161739_1280

 

 

A little over a year ago I was in a meeting with one of my business partners discussing how to react to the new marketing reality.   The traditional sales approach of cold calling and sending out salesmen to land the sale by educating the customer was no longer working.  Refreshing our website and adding a timely blog, following the pundits of the day made no difference.  I suspect that adding a proliferation of data on the web only made our competitors more knowledgeable.

  Innovation turned out to be the answer. It has to be a financially useful innovation. No, adding pink polka dots, while innovative, does not add real value.  And you cannot skip the work of doing the A-B testing to demonstrate that the customer agrees that the “improvement” beneficially changes the total cost of ownership.  .  We discovered that in this recovery, hidden in the background are a whole lot of innovations that actually improve the total cost of ownership, as seen by the customer.  In this case, Tesla style lithium batteries, driverless controls and flat free aperture style tires changed the economics entirely.

The information on all of these wonderful innovations is out there on the web.  Information overload applies.  None of us has the time to sort through the myriads of web information to separate the wheat from the chaff.  Enter the traditional role of the salesmen with the latest twist.  The customers want more than just catalogs of information.  Salesmen, who can provide them with the guidance on how the latest innovations will improve their operational costs, clinch the sale.  A resultant 30% sales growth by my partner shows that this pivot finally was in the right direction.

The pace of innovation is so great that even I get blind sided.  After making a $200,000 annual saving last year using the new surface technology, I felt smug.  A thin layer of very high cost materials are grown on the surface of cheaper materials.  In certain applications this is all that is needed to make the material perform like it was entirely made of the more expensive material.  A business partner called me about a new customer application in the same category.  The Lord must have been looking after me, because I elected to defer to my expert. This is a good thing because I would have missed a new innovation that doubles the saving  because it just was developed in the last 5 years.  It is all out there on the web but I did not know where to look or that I should be looking.

Salesmen are more important then ever.  In this climate the best help your team can provide is a new and shiney innovative item to break down the customer doors.

 

Reinventing The Wheel for Lean Logistics

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Ford Assembly 1923

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Mankind started out as hunters and gatherers.  As this Chinese proverb reminds us, “Man who sits on side of mountain waiting for roast duck to fly into mouth, waits a long time.”  The goods were not coming to the man.  … Continue reading →

Lean Multiplication

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Material Handling Robot

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MANY PUNDITS PROPOSE that universal STEM training is needed to evolve our workforce into “de facto junior engineers”.  It may have been necessary to have the entire population trained in the latest technology when our ancestors were hunters and gatherers, … Continue reading →

3D Printing – An Invisible Revolution

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3D PRINTING, a current hot news item, is actually the result of a gradual, almost invisible revolution in mold making which has finally reached a transformative point. The point where it can revolutionize the manufacture of equipment, like stock chasers, … Continue reading →