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Aldo Corona is a Customer Success Manager at Drishti.
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Keeping the assembly line flowing smoothly is a manufacturer’s constant challenge. But even the most mature lean manufacturers will suffer slowdowns as myriad production issues arise. Occasionally, the problem on a line will be obvious. In these cases, the solution is clear: reallocate or duplicate resources appropriately, balance the line and verify the change. More often, the cause of a bottleneck is not immediately clear, prompting manufacturers to try multiple changes that can be ineffective or can even make production worse.
What causes bottlenecks?
Bottlenecks in production are all about even flow. It is a game of balance between workstations and managing gating areas. If workstation 3 produces four units in one minute, and workstation 5 is only able to produce three units consistently, station 5 will likely become a bottleneck if changes aren’t made. This may seem obvious, but on advanced lines with multiple production flows and workstations, with cycle times varying by seconds, bottlenecks are not always easy to spot and don’t always appear immediately.
In some cases, the bottleneck doesn’t manifest in the station that is actually causing the slowdowns. When this happens, manufacturers spend resources trying to remedy problems at the wrong station (which, of course, does not address the slowdown at all).
To prevent bottlenecks, we have to consider what causes a bottleneck in the first place. Most of the time, it’s one of three situations:
Poor information or materials flow
Is the material gated and batched properly to allow for continuous flow? Is there an unintended consequence if material is not replenished at one of the workstations?
Consider a cookout where hot dogs come in packs of 10 and buns come in packs of eight. If you want to keep the hot dogs flowing, you’d better have someone ready to replenish the buns well before the second hot dog package is opened..
Additionally, consider the accordion effect — ever notice when you’re sitting far back from a stop light that the first cars get away quickly and then distance seems to stretch between the next rows of cars until it’s time for you to go and then (oh no!) red light for you again? This situation happens in production if a line doesn’t focus its efforts and communicate up and down the line appropriately both in terms of information and material.
A note on equipment
When analyzing materials flow, also remember that equipment can cause issues, but not always in obvious ways. Ensuring maintenance and also thinking about how identical equipment is used in different processes is important to continuous flow. Just because the same equipment is used in two different tasks doesn’t mean the time taken will be equal — context matters.
Poor processes
The process is the number one consideration for quality and success on the production line. Is your process well defined? Is there an element that is taken for granted, or is it, perhaps, tribal knowledge?
Make sure your processes are truly standardized, rather than just simple work instructions. If the people you depend on to carry out the assembly process all have a different understanding of the steps required, then it is unrealistic to expect consistent quality, quantity or time for the tasks.
The people factor
Are there enough hands doing the work? Similar to materials flow (and equipment), you may need more hands in one workstation than in another. Maybe you need two people on one station for an hour each day before you move them to another station.
People are incredibly adaptable for making up the difference on the production line. Including your line workers in the equation adds valuable insights. Do they know exactly what is expected? Have they received enough training to effectively keep up with the production as needed? Assuming you have a fully trained staff, do you have people in places on the line that are best suited to their unique abilities? Remember, not everyone is suited for every task.
New technology can help
Looking at these elements, both between individual workstations and along the whole line, can help spot potential issues. I recommend thinking about them critically when planning your production lines. But even with everything running smoothly on well-planned lines, finding bottlenecks can still be challenging, even for the most experienced manufacturers.
HELLA found this out when they used Drishti to balance their line. They discovered that not only were the bottlenecks not where they thought they were, but they were also having ergonomic issues with one of their key processes.
New technologies can provide real time, continuous and unbiased feedback allowing you to see process flaws and production issues that would normally take months (or more) of guesswork to discover. Drishti’s solution can provide all that and more, ensuring that:
Your workers are adequately trained and are performing tasks correctly.
The process is effective and working as expected.
Insights are delivered quicker than ever to make sure that supervisors can make quick decisions to improve line production and address any issues.
And with Drishti’s suite of reports, it’s easy to trend and forecast production. Drishti even has a line balancing report (Figure 1), allowing you to quickly assess whether a bottleneck will occur on your line.
(Figure 1: Drishti Line Balancing Report)
Nobody likes a bottleneck. Luckily, new technology like Drishti can help manufacturers correctly identify bottleneck stations and mitigate the cause of the slowdown faster than ever before.
Interested in finding out more about how Drishti can help you? Check out our solutions page for more info on upgrading to AI-powered production.
