Lean Manufacturing-Case Study at MACPL

Lean Manufacturing- a case study at MACPL
Chapter 1
History of lean manufacturing
It is a popular fact that JIT system started in the initial years after the World War II in
Japan for the Toyota automobile system. Toyoda family in Japan decided to change their
automatic loom manufacturing business to the automobile business. But they had few
problems to overcome. They could not compete with the giants like Ford in the foreign
markets. Therefore Toyota had to depend upon the small local markets. They also had to
bring down the raw materials from out side. Also they had to produce in small batches. They
haven’t had much of capital to work with. Therefore capital was very important. With these
constrains Taiichi Ohno took over the challenge of achieving the impossible. With his right
hand man Dr. Sheigo Shingo for next three decades he built the Toyota production system or
the Just In Time system.
Although the concept was mastered in Japan for the Toyota production system, the
roots of this concept goes into the sixteenth century. Eli Whitney’s concept of
interchangeable parts said to be the very initial beginning of this concept. But first or at least
famous implementation of something similar to JIT happened a century later in
manufacturing of Ford Model T (in 1910) automobile design. Manufacturing was based on
line assembly. Every part moved without interruptions to the next value adding point. Parts
are manufactured and assembled in a continuous flow. Even Henry Ford may not have
understood the basics behind his system. But it saved lots of money and made Henry Ford a
richest on the planet at that time. Although very successful in the initial years, Ford system
had it drawbacks. One of the major drawbacks was that it’s inability to the change. This was
due to the push strategy implemented in the Fords system. They relied on keeping machine
busy without thinking about the final outcome. They had huge stocks in the form of finished
goods and in the form of Work In Progress. This led to the inflexibility of the system.
Another major draw back of the system was the poor handling of the human resource. This
led to have a less motivated set of people in the organization. But in Japan, they studied the
system very well and saw the problems that Ford system had. But the core concept of the
Ford system was obeyed. This is the continuous flow of value system. Anything distracting it
treated as a waste. Various pioneered work from people like Deming and Juran in the field of
quality improvement was used in the system. This brought built in quality to the system.
More importantly Ohno and Shingo understood the drawbacks in the push system and
understood the role played by the inventory. This led to Pull system rather than the push
system, where the parts are produced only when they are pulled by the pr
Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 1

ocess before that. This is similar to the concepts in the super markets. When the shells are
being emptied (that is when people buy the product), they are refilled with new ones.
This system developed in Toyota from 1949 to 1975 virtually unnoticed by the others
even within Japan. But in the oil crisis in 1973 Japan economy suffered and most of the
industries had losses. But Toyota overcame these problems. They stood out from the rest.
This was the eye opener for other Japanese firms to implement this system. But this system
got popular in the western world with the book “The machine that change the world” written
by James Womack in 1990. This book was aimed to give the history of the automobile with
the plant details of some of these manufacturers. He gave the name “Lean Manufacturing to
this system”. This was the eye opener for the western world about this system. Thereafter the
concepts were practiced all over the world. Experiences and knowledge vastly improved the
system.
But there were many people who just tried to use the tools in lean manufacturing
without understanding the meaning of them. They eventually failed. But there are number of
places this system is working well. The complete elimination of waste is the target of the
system. This concept is vitally important today since in today’s highly competitive world
there is nothing we can waste.

Chapter 2
INTRODUCTION
2.1 What is Lean Manufacturing?

Much as mass production was the production system of the 20th century, lean
manufacturing, which focuses on the elimination of waste in the production process, has been
heralded as the production system of the 21st century. Although the Japanese automaker
Toyota pioneered the concept, the term lean manufacturing itself was coined in the early
1990s by three researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The National
Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Manufacturing Extension Partnership’s Lean
Network offers the following definition of lean manufacturing:
“A systematic approach to identifying and eliminating waste through continuous

improvement, flowing the product at the pull of the customer in pursuit of perfection.”
Although the NIST definition is brief, it is packed with information. First, the
approach to becoming lean must be systematic. You can try to improve certain areas of the
business and have some degree of success, but to truly realize the benefits of lean; you must
start with an overall strategy and put it into place in the right order. Second, a lean strategy
focuses on eliminating waste. Later in this paper, you will learn about common types of
waste and the methods used to identify and eliminate them. Third, note the phrases
continuous improvement and pursuit of perfection. Perfection can never be achieved, but each
step closer increases the profitability and viability of your company. The process of
developing a lean enterprise never ends. Lean is not a destination but a journey. There is
always something else that you can do to reduce waste or improve a process.
2.2 The Principles of Lean Manufacturing

As with most other production philosophies and management practices, lean principles
cannot be universally applied. However, because they are fundamentally customer value
driven, they are suitable for many manufacturing environments 3.
There are five basic principles of lean manufacturing:
Understanding Customer Value —Value must be externally focused. Only what your
customers perceive as value is important.
Value Stream Analysis — Once you understand the value that you deliver to your
customers, you need to analyze all the steps in your business processes to determine which
ones actually add value. If an action does not add value, you should consider changing it or
removing it from the process.
Flow — Instead of moving the product from one work center to the next in large batches,
production should flow continuously from raw materials to finished goods in dedicated
production cells.
Pull — Rather than building goods to stock, customer demand pulls finished goods through
the system. Work is not performed unless the part is required downstream.
Perfection — As you eliminate waste from your processes and flow product continuously
according to the demands of your customers, you will realize that there is no end to reducing
time, cost, space, mistakes, and effort.
These five lean principles work together and are fundamental to the elimination of waste.
You can revisit each of them as improvements in one provide an opportunity for
improvements in another.
All five lean principles can be applied nearly anywhere, but lean principles do not always
apply when customer demand is unstable and unpredictable.
2.3 Definition Of Work Components

2.4 The Lean Definition of Waste

 Waste is anything that does not add value to your product or service.
 It is anything other than the minimum amount of equipment, materials, parts,

space and employees' time which is absolutely essential to add value to the
product or service.
 Necessary activities add Value.
 Unnecessary or wasteful activities add Cost.
2.5 Seven Basic Types of Waste

 Waste from overproduction
 Waste from waiting times
 Transportation waste
 Processing Waste
 Inventory Waste
 Waste of motion
 Waste from product defects
2.6 Can all the wastes be avoided?

Yes you can avoid all the wastes in the system in theory. But in practical situations
removing all the wastes might not be possible. Some might be not possible due to technical
concerns; some are due to various obvious factors. For an example you have to transport the
goods at least a little amount even within the working flow without adding any value to that.
Anyway you will have to get down the raw materials for the manufacturing of product from
far places. These can not be avoided. If you try to avoid some of these wastes that will cost
you much more in the bigger picture. Always remember the bigger picture is what that
always matters.
Therefore it is very important to categorize the wastes according to availability
of them. When you do that all the wastes in the organization will fall in to the
one of the following two categories.
o .. wastes that are avoidable

o .. wastes that are unavoidable
Deciding what are the avoidable and what are unavoidable will require some good
decision making. Lot of learning, experimenting and thinking has to go into this process.
When you decide on this or at least have some idea about the wastes which are avoidable,
then it is the time to understand the importance of removing each waste from the system. A
tool like Pareto curve will be an ideal tool to understand the problems according to their
importance of removing them.
Always you have to give the importance to the bigger picture to stop creating a new waste
in the system in the effort of removing one. Always an overall reduction should be there.
What about the other wastes which we thought irremovable. Should they remain
untouched? No, not at all. With the time there are new technologies, and many developments
coming on. Also when you are removing some of the problems from the avoidable category,
you fill find the ways to tackle some problems in this category as well. Therefore nothing is
permanent. You will get tons of chances to overcome these problems.
Chapter 3
Lean Manufacturing tools
. Lean manufacturing is based on continuous finding and removal of the wastes. Value
is defined from the customer’s point of view. Therefore all the tools in lean manufacturing
aim to identify and remove wastes from the system continuously. There are four steps in
implementing lean manufacturing. They are;
1. Identifying the fact that there are wastes to be removed
2. Analyzing the wastes and finding the root causes for these wastes
3. Finding the solution for these root causes
4. Application of these solutions and achieving the objective
When this is done go back to the stage 1 and continue this loop over and over again.
To become lean it is very necessary to understand the fact that wastes are there. You must
also be able to find out where these wastes do exist. Then you will be able to find out the root
causes for these problems and then come up with a way to solve it. To find out where in the
process these wastes exist there is a very powerful and simple tool. This well known tool is
process mapping.
Process map simply maps all the processes and the activities which are carried out in
bringing a specific product or a service in to a reality. Irrelevant of the value they add to the
final product or the service, the process map includes all the activities from the point of
development or order inquiry to making and shipping the goods and up to the point where
customer collects the goods.
By sticking to a single product or a service you will find it very easy to make the
process map. This also makes it easy to understand the process when someone refers to the
process map. Or another way you can create a map which is simpler and easy to understand is
by creating an overall map with all the departments and their interconnectivity, and then map
the processes within the departments separately. This way you will get a good map which is
simpler to understand and much more conclusive. You can use the standard symbols used in
the process mapping to create a process map which can be understand by all the people
easily.
When you map the process, you will start to see the;
1. Value added and
2. Non value added activities

You will also have better idea of what are the avoidable, non value added activities
and what are the non value added unavoidable activities.
After understanding these clearly, you have to create the process map for the future.
This will include only the value added activities and the non value added but unavoidable
activities. The process changes and the lay out changes etc are also possible in creating this
ideal layout. This is so important since there after your aim is to get this ideal position. This
will be the aim for your future.
By now you have clearly understand the wastes that you have to remove from the
system. But what should be given the priority. Finding the order of the problems that should
be according to the priority of talking is one of the very important issues to be addressed
correctly.
After finding out the order of talking of the problems, you have to find out the root
causes for these problems in order to avoid these problems. For an example if you have
frequent machine breakdowns, you will find the cause for this problem is untrained workers,
poor maintenance, poor quality machinery used etc. then you will be able to analyze these
causes again find out the causes for them as well. For an example why the staff is not trained
properly is because most of them are new and have not had enough time to be trained. Then
you will be able to come up with a way of training people when they just join in so that you
will avoid this problem. It is generally advised that not to go than three steps down the line in
finding root causes.
Ok, now you know what are the wastes that your organization as and you also know
what is the taking order for these problems. You also know the root causes for the selected
problems. After knowing all these facts, now is the time to move to the problem solving
process.
Lean manufacturing offers few readymade and well proven solutions for any industry.
But always you have to customize these solutions to suit your organization. Always keep in
mind, lean manufacturing does not start with the tools, it starts with lean thinking.
3.1 JIT (Just In Time)

Often this term JIT is used with JIT interchangeably. It is that much interconnected with lean
manufacturing; in fact JIT is the backbone of the lean manufacturing. Actually the concept
grew first with the Toyota system was the JIT. Then it developed to the lean manufacturing.
JIT is one key way to get read of most of the wastes which we have already discussed in the

early chapters. JIT concepts are based on the pull demand model. Everything is done when
they are actually needed.
JIT has three main areas:
 JIT purchasing
 JIT Production
 JIT distribution
Purchasing is done when the goods are actually needed by the production. No large
stocks are maintained. Often purchasing is done in small batches continuously. This allows
production to run smoothly. This will also reduce the costs due to storage, and also will
minimize the degrading of the goods. This way it is easy to monitor quality defects and
correct them if there are any in the subsequent batches. Also this will help to achieve shorter
lead-times in the production.
But achieving this has problems to overcome. First of all the supplier base of the
organization should be manageable. Then they have to agree to produce in small batches and
send them in the continuously. Minimum order quantity issues must be solved. The supplier
must be able to adjust to the changes fast and also he must be able to keep the correct quality
from batch to the other. And there may be much more problems to overcome. To overcome
this corporate level involvement is very much required. When achieved this will mutually
benefit both you and your supplier.
JIT manufacturing might be the most talked topic of all lean manufacturing
techniques. This requires very good internal coordination and planning. Even within the
manufacturing area, pull demand concepts are used. The items are produced only when they
are required by the process following it. No stocks are maintained. This will reduce the costs
due to WIP. This will also reduce the cycle time of the product, and therefore will improve
the flexibility of the system immensely. This will also reduce the lead time considerably.
Quality defects will be much lower since WIP is very low.
Achieving JIT manufacturing is again not an easy task. Most of the time this requires
a radical change in the organization. Work will change from the conventional departmental
thinking to the new team thinking. Manufacturing will change from the line system to the
module or work cell based manufacturing. Every problem will cause the system to stop since
there is no WIP to work with. All the problems hidden in the WIP will be revealed. Some
people might not like the system. In short there will be tons of problems to be solved. This
requires some courage and temperament.
It is true to say that most of the problems in achieving JIT manufacturing is has to
deal with the human side of the problem. People do not like to change if there is no
motivation to do so. People will fear about their jobs. They can bring lots of negative
thoughts to this. Of cause negative thoughts are important.

You will have to deal with these problems very carefully. One thing that you have to
do first of all is driving out the fear with this change. Specially regarding their jobs. You have
to take their participation in the process and let them to understand themselves that this is not
something that should be feared about. You have to motivate people by continuous education
about the new system. One smart idea may be to use the same names which they are familiar
before for the new systems. For an example use the word bin card instead of a kanban card.
People will feel immensely comfortable with the names they have been using before. You
also will not loose anything, as far as you are applying the kanban techniques in your
production.
Apart from these problems there are very serious of problems which has to be dealt
with transporting the goods. Since there will not be much of a stock to rely on, every load of
goods is very important for smooth production run. Any delay will be very costly.
To achieve a smooth production without any delays in production and to distribute the
goods in small batches to the buyers in continuous basis, it is very important to keep a good
transportation management system. Generally this is known as the JIT distribution. Without
this any of the lean objectives might not be possible. Most often this function is given to a
third party logistic company, who will take care of JIT distribution. On time, uninterrupted
data exchange is very vital in this. Therefore it is advisable of using an electronic way of data
interchange. It is also very much necessary to automate this data transfer function to avoid
any delays and mistakes in duplication.
3.2 JIDOKA- Automation with a human touch

Jidoka is one of the main tools of lean. In fact it is treated as one of the main pillars of
lean manufacturing. Although Jidoka is very important tool, as most of lean tools it stays
simple both to understand and practice.
Jidoka is often explained as “Automation with a human touch”. In other words this
means automation with some degree of human involvement. When your machinery runs
normally and processes are being followed properly, there is nothing you should worry about.
But if your processes and machinery are not producing expected results, and if it continues to
run, you have a problem in your hand. You will end up with tons of faulty goods.
This is where the concept of Jidoka comes to play. If there is something wrong in
your operation, Jidoka suggests you to stop immediately and then fix the problem before start
running your process gain. This will ensure you remove the problem from the process so you
will not be making piles of faulty items. Jidoka is often used with Pokayoke and Visual
control concepts. Visual indicators are used to highlight the errors and Poka yoke is practiced
to avoid the identified problems in future.

Jidoka makes it very hard to hide problems. When you stop the line, you create a
crisis. If you have no solution to the problem, you will not be able to continue with
manufacturing. So solving problems becomes a must.
Although it is simple enough to understand and implement, for an organization to

come to the point of Jidoka implementation it take some change. Implementing Jidoka calls
for a complete shift in traditional management mentality. Traditionally, stopping the
manufacturing line is treated as a crime, something you should not do at all. People are
encouraged to continue the work regardless of the problems which may come through.
So changing the mentality will not be easy. This will be the main problem associated
with implementing Jidoka in any organization.
3.3 5 WHY? Simple but effective
Just like any good mechanic, a good lean expert should have many tools to help them
do their job. While a mechanic may be fixing something under the hood of a car, a lean
expert will be fixing something under the hood of a business. Unlike a mechanic’s
troubleshooting, sometimes the real reason why something is not functioning inside a
business isn’t readily apparent, and there isn’t a manual to troubleshoot it. Additionally, it
may be masked by other problems that appear to be the real reason, or “root cause”, when in
truth, it is only a diversion.
Avoiding this is a very important job of all people who work in a company, primarily a lean
expert, or someone who works on the quality team. There are many ways in which the quality
team can approach the problem, and the 5 why technique is one of them. It is designed to help
get to the real root cause of a problem, so the cause can be addressed through a short term or
long term corrective action. The corrective action, then, can be tracked for its effectiveness.
The 5 why system is one in which the simple question “why?” is asked at 5 different
levels of a problem to get to the bottom of the situation. It was first used in the early 1970’s
by the Toyota Company, who is often credited with being the pioneer of modern quality. If
used correctly, it can provide a way to help identify the true root cause of the problem by
using a feedback system. An added benefit is that it can be used both on an individual basis
as well as a part of a group attack.
The 5 why technique is a great tool when used in conjunction with other tools as an
aide in finding the root cause of a problem. Like any other tool, it should be wielded by
someone who understands how to thoroughly investigate problems and conduct a solid root
cause analysis.

The 5 why technique is a great tool when used in conjunction with other tools as an
aide in finding the root cause of a problem. Like any other tool, it should be wielded by
someone who understands how to thoroughly investigate problems and conduct a solid root
cause analysis
Chapter 4
Advantages of lean manufacturing
Lean Manufacturing is a buzzword. More often it is used with the terms like benefits,
cost reduction, lead-time reduction etc. but if you have not started implementing lean
manufacturing yet and if you have not started benefiting from lean manufacturing yet, you
will need some numbers to be motivated. We shall look into some quantified benefits of lean
manufacturing where the principles of lean are implemented successfully. Lean
manufacturing is
normally known to reduce the;
 Lead time by 50% at least (some reports says stories where lead time is being reduced
up to 90%)
 Reduced WIP up to 80%

 Floor space savings around 30 %( sometimes more than 50%)

 Increased productivity at least by 30%. (even more than 100% in some
 cases)
 Quality improvement by a factor of two
 Overall cost reduction
Above are only the quantified and most common advantages. But there are ore and
more other advantages come with lean manufacturing. Among them are:
 Good team spirit which will drive your organization to the excellence
 Innovative culture in the organization
 Self driven people
 Pleasant working conditions
 Worker involvement and improved worker satisfaction
 Longer machine life
 Systematic approach to work
 Improved flexibility
 Environmentally friendly & Built in quality
There are many other advantages which are not listed here. Even these advantages are
not listed in any order. These will be more or less important to you according to your
immediate requirements.
Some successful lean manufacturers claim that they have achieved some unexpected
good result when they shifted to lean manufacturing. The reason for this is the chain effect
created by the lean manufacturing implementation.
One improvement always stimulates a better change in some other area. This will lead
to a huge change in the organization, even in the areas where you not intended to have an
improvement with the action you took. Therefore the synergy effect is very important
advantage in lean manufacturing.
One more thing to remember in evaluating the advantages of lean manufacturing. You
should never count the individual improvements, like how well a department performs or
how well a particular team operates. All the advantages must be weighed in the bigger
picture. All the advantages must be weighed according to their importance to the
improvement of the total system. Therefore always remember to have the full picture in your
mind.

Chapter 5
Objectives
 To compare the existing production technique (after lean implementation)
with the techniques used in MACPL before lean implementation.
 To obtain a universally applicable method to identify areas of large

inventories, long lead time, over production and lack of information co-
ordination.
 To guide the other industries to see the waste in their value stream and identify
the lean tools that best fit the environment
 Primary idea of the project is to help the industries to take initiatives to adopt
such as lean in order to become more competitive in today’s global market.

Chapter 6
Study of Wastes at MACPL
6.1 Waste of Overproduction
If you make more product than is required by the next process, make it earlier than is
required by the next process, or make product faster than is required by the next process, you
overproduce.

The word over production can be used to describe a type of waste which is in most of
the places and we never think this as a waste. This is producing something before it is
actually required. This can be applied to the bigger picture or in more localized sense.
In the bigger picture, this is equivalent to create a product or a service before it is

actually required. Lean manufacturing always trusts on pulling rather than pushing. This
means that every service or product must be pulled from the process immediately after that.
Therefore a product or a service must be pulled by the customer. In much more simpler way,
customer must have the real requirement for the product or the service being produced. If you
produce the goods without any stimulation from the market, then either you will have to keep
the product with you until there is a market for that product or you have to create the market
stimulation with huge advertis

ing campaigns etc. this is known as the push strategy. Still you will not have the guaranty that
this will be able to sell the products without wastages.
In the much smaller picture, the word over production might mean producing a part of
a product before it is required by the assembly line or the process after that. For an example
there is no point of making more receivers than the phones intended to be produced. The
extra amount will be a lost.
Over production accounts for many loses. One is the waste due to unnecessary parts.
This also will make the WIP higher. Flow will not be smoother. This obviously leads to low
quality products and defects as quality problems are hidden in the WIP maintained due to
over production.
The waste of making too much, too soon, too fast compared to the needs of the next
process. Certain causes for over-production are Just-in-case logic, Misuse of automation,
Long process setup, Non-level scheduling, Unbalanced workload, Misunderstood
communications, and Unreliable shipment by suppliers. After the implementation of lean
in MACPL the over-production was reduced from13.8 tones in the year 2007-08 to 9 tones in
2009-10. The graph below gives a clear view of tones of production in three consecutive
years. The pink bar shows a considerable decrease in over-production after the
implementation of lean. .
Fig 6.1: Graph of over-production
6.2 Waste from Waiting times

 Operator or machine idle time.
 Causes of Waiting Waste.
 Unbalanced work load & un-level scheduling.
 Unplanned maintenance.
 Long process set-up times.
 Upstream quality problem.
Even a single minute lost in waiting can not be recovered in the process there after.
Analyze how long the products are waiting against the time used for processing them. This is
one big contributory factor for the higher lead times. This simply means you take 100 hours
or more to complete work which is worthier only 10 hours. Ninety hours or more is lost and
added to the lead time. No waiting means you can deliver the goods within 10 days which
actually took 100 days earlier. The flexibility obtained with this was only imaginable before
lean. If you can do this, you are there to compete with the changing markets and react to the
changes very fast, even before your competitors. This will also reduce the WIP and tons of
related problems. Also considerable savings on the production space and reduction in work in
capital can be achieved. Among the cause of this problem is due to the high volume
machinery, unawareness of the people, and conventional thinking of the people play leading
roles.
Any activity that consumes time without adding value, especially equipment
downtime, waiting for materials, setup, etc., are termed as waiting time. Causes for waiting
may be due to Poor machine maintenance, Line imbalances, Poor setup discipline, and Poor
communication between processes.

Fig 6.2: Graph of process time
The graph above depicts the average status of casting waiting time over the period of four
years and it can be clearly seen that after implementation of lean strategy there has been a
considerable decrease in waiting time from 23days to 15 days. This could be possible due to
the implementation of mold heating or mold baking oven that reduced the mold curing time
from four hours to two hours. Increasing the size of the sand hopper for storing reclaimed
sand from five tones to ten tones. Installation of bailing machine to squeeze the loose scraps
before being fed into the furnace, this has helped in reduction of melting time. It is possible to
extract thirteen melts per day as compared to ten melts earlier.
6.3 Waste of Transportation

 Poor plant layout
 Poor understanding of the process flow for production

 Large batch sizes, long lead times, and large storage areas.
No matter how well you do transporting. It does not add value to the end product.
Therefore simply transportation is one of the wastes that have to be eliminated from the
production system. This accounts for the quality defects, maintenance of a higher WIP, and
additional cost of transporting the goods. Transportation often caused by poor work place
organization. Inflexibility of the layout plays a big role here. This can be avoided with careful
re-designing of the layouts.
Transporting parts and materials around the plant, stacking and un-stacking, etc.,
without any value add to the component is a real waste to the company which causes loss of
precious working time. The cast products moved in zigzag pattern around the shop floor for
different processes to be carried out on them such as knock out, riser separation, welding etc.,
but now the same processes are carried out on the cast products but in a more appropriate
way. Flow concept has been introduced thereby curbing the zigzag movements of materials.
With flow concept the alloy steel products and stainless steel products are moved in different
streams, this has reduced the time and labor needed for bifurcation of the products at the end
of the stream as done earlier before the final dispatch.

Fig 6.3: Process flow before lean implementation

Fig 6.4: process flow after lean implementation
6.4 Processing Waste

Effort that adds no value to the product or service from the customers’ viewpoint.
This is the using incorrect tools for the job. This does not mean that you should use
complicated or expensive tools to do the job. It is about using the correct tool for the correct
job. Low cost automation is one program where Toyota found to be really effective.
Developing such tools can be done with the aid of workers, because they know the job they
do more than anyone. Then this will become a very good way of motivating people as well.
The enemy for this system is the mind set of the people who work in the organization. People
naturally think like best equipment for the job is expensive and complex. So how to
overcome this problem, which will not only save money for you but also motivate people
immensely. Change the mind set of the people by education and training. Also create a
culture of continuous improvement. Then people will always look for the better ways of
doing things, which creates opportunity for these kinds of innovations.
Reprocessing has to be done due to the processing error or any minor flaw detected
during the inspection stage. It is considered as a waste as it consumes valuable time of
production. When considered the monthly analysis of production i.e. in 2007-08 total
production was 185tones of which 15tones was reworked and 5 tones was rejected
considering the same for 2009-10 actual production was 212 tones of which 36 tones was
reworked and 6 tones rejected. It is known from the graph that the year 2006-07 and 2007-08
the percentage of rework was well above 16% but after the implementation of lean concepts
it has been reduced to 8.1% in 2008-09 and to almost nil in the current financial year.

Fig 6.5: Graph of re-processing
6.5 Inventory Waste

Maintaining excess inventory of raw materials, parts in process, or finished goods.
 Protects the company from inefficiencies and unexpected problems.
 Product complexity
 Unbalanced workload, unleveled scheduling
 Poor Market forecast
 Unreliable shipments by suppliers
Reducing inventory is an important goal of the lean organization. Carrying inventory

has many costs associated with it. Obvious costs include: capital tied up in inventory and the
associated loss of interest on that capital, loss due to material handling damage, increased
labor costs for material handling, and increased space and storage requirement. A cost from
excess inventory that is not so obvious is quality. The reasoning is that if an upstream process
is producing parts on a machine and defects occur halfway through the batch, in an
organization with low levels of inventory the next downstream process will discover the
defects sooner. An organization with low inventory levels can stop the process when the
defect is discovered, throw out the defective inventory, and request the previous process to
start another batch. The organization with lower inventory levels will also be more effective
at determining what caused the defect because the batch that the defect occurred in is fresh in
the minds of both production and maintenance.
Inventory can be termed both as waste and also a factor of protection in times of
unexpected problems a company faces. Causes of inventory being not understanding the
costs, inadequate education/training/work instructions, Lack of standards, Customer needs
not understood. Saving optimum amount of inventory for production and placing an order for
the same at the prefixed level is the beauty of lean. Just in time manufacturing (JIT) is the
practice of maintaining and manufacturing just enough inventory to fulfill the orders that
have been placed, and not a single piece more Kanban-push to pull processing system along
with activity based costing is applied here. If JIT is the entire system that defines the pull
version of production and manufacturing, then Kanban is the signal that triggers the
production when the inventory level reaches a level of exhaustion triggering a card places an
order and the supplier responds to this pull and supplies the items. ABC analysis is done to
group the different items needed for production in groups like A, B and C depending on their
cost and amount of that particular item consumed per day. JIT also takes care that only the
needed inventory is delivered, excess storage and wastage of space is eliminated.
MATERIAL DAILY LEAD BUFFER STOCK ACTUAL VALUE RATE/KG

12.03.201
CONSUMPTION TIME-IN STOCK 0 STOCK
QTY IN KGS DAYS D.C*L.T

A ITEMS
S.S.316L SCRAP 1039 15 15585 6075 6075 783675 129
PURE NICKEL 143 40 5720 1309 1309 1106105 845
M.S.SCRAP 5367 2 10734 23270 23270 442130 19
S.S.304 SCRAP 447 10 4470 1810 1810 132130 73
FE.MOLYBDENUM 38 15 570 438 438 365730 835
FENOTEC 543 3 1629 3750 3750 255000 68
B ITEMS
S.S.SCRAP 2205 127 15 1905 5532 5532 746820 135
0.05 FERRO CHROME 227 6 1362 5910 5910 916050 155
SILICA SAND 32371 4 129484 126800 126800 176252 1.39
NICKEL SCRAP 45% 25 40 1000 0 0 0 834
PURE MOLYBEDENUM 11 10 110 541 541 1000850 1850
0.03 CHROME 297 6 1782 3806 3806 704110 185
MOULD COATING 315 6 1890 3620 3620 282360 78
E.L.C.M.S. 863 4 3452 11705 11705 362855 31
S.S.2507 40 15 600 0 0 0 292.32
HARDNER H160 60 6 360 550 550 96800 176
IRON MELTING FLAKE 427 6 2562 1945 1945 83635 43
S.K.O 250 5 1250 2550 2550 94350 37
HARDNER-120 68 6 408 650 650 95550 147
SELENIUM METAL 2 10 20 48 48 120000 2500
SATACORE PART A 150 15 2250 2000 2000 133000 66.5
6.6 Waste of motion
Any movement of people or machines without adding value

 Poor people/machine effectiveness
 Inconsistent work methods
 Unfavorable facility or cell layout
 Poor workplace organization and housekeeping
This waste is often overlooked. When performing a certain task people have to repeat
their motions again and again. Although we do not realize, in many places people will have to
move, bend or reach to collect some part or to reach a machine. If a time study can be done to
check the percentage of the time for these unnecessary movements, you will see it is actually
very high than you think. Even the other ergonomic conditions like correct lighting, tool
arrangement, work process management is essential to achieve a good productivity from the
people poor conditions are not good for the health of the worker obviously. Also this will
waste large amounts of time. Workplaces will become very untidy. Workers will get tired
easily. The reason for this is poor workplace organization.
Poor workplace layout is the main cause of wasted motion hence to rectify that the whole
plant has been replanned to restrict wasted motion as much as possible. Before implementing
lean all the major work equipments were constituted in hall 1 itself. Sand mixer, molding,
sand reclamation and mixer, knock out, riser separation, shot blasting machine, inspection
and repair welding and sand storage yard & sand transporter were all under single hood. The
scrap was stored in scrap yard in open area. The old company layout below shows that entire
casting operation was carried out in hall 1, the components moved out for machining process
and later would undergo inspection and dispatch.

Fig 6.6: Old layout of M.A.C.P.L
This layout posed problems mainly for the workers as the fumes from welding would cause
irritation and fatigue among workers and the movement of casting in the shop floor was in
zigzag pattern causing restriction in motion. After implementation of lean the plant layout
was changed according to flow concept.
Hall 1 & 2 now comprises of sand mixing and molding section, melting furnace and pouring
section, riser separation, shot blasting, inspection & repair welding, heat treatment with
risers(normalizing) unit.
Hall 3 is now completely available for rework grinding and inspection work.
Hall 4 was newly constructed after relayouting and it comprises of 3 heat treatment furnaces
(2 shifted from hall3 and a new furnace), shot blasting and 2 grit blasting machines. The new
plant layout looks as below:

Fig6.7: New layout of MACPL

Table 6.1: Specification of layout
Sl no PARTICULARS IDENTIFICATION
1 Induction Furnace IF1 & IF2
2 Continuous Mixer CNSM1& CNSM2
3 Sand reclamation SR
4 Shot Blasting machine SB1&SB2
5 Heat treatment furnace HT1 – HT$
6 Welding Rectifier W1- W9
7 Lathe Machine LH
8 Drilling machine DR
9 Hydro testing machine HD
10 Grit blasting machine AGB1 &AGB2
6.7 Waste from product defects

“All the time and cost incurred due to getting something wrong”
 Weak process control
 Poor product & process design
 Deficient planned maintenance
 Inadequate education/training/work instructions
 Misunderstood Customer needs.
The entire above are wastes them. But they lead to another waste which is extremely
costly. These are the defected product. In the case of services this is the poor quality of the
service. Defects call for higher inspection and related costs. If you find a defect, you will
have to remove it. The raw materials, time, effort and the money put in to this product will be
wasted. Even worst, if this defected product goes to the customers hand you will loose the
image for your organization. Also there is a risk of claims. In the long run this will be a big
cost for the organization. As I mentioned earlier all the above wastes, poor raw material,
mistakes from the workers, problems in the system, machinery problems and much more
accounts for this problem. So removing this from the system is long time task. Making the
system fool proofed, getting good quality raw material, educating people are among the
solutions for this.
Waste of inspection, repair and scrapping of material to which value has already been
added accounts to much more loss to the company than any other defects. Steps should be
taken to eliminate defects at the last stage and incur huge losses. This has been made possible
by introducing spot inspection. Training the worker to inspect the product before leaving his
work cell for further processing. Incorporating quality system like GO and NO-GO gauges to
check the dimensions and visual inspection for any defects. The rejection rate has been
decreased to 3.5% in the year 2009-10 compared to 4.68% in year 2008-09 for production
exceeding 2000tones in every year during comparison.
6.8 Energy Waste

Power is the major raw material for the foundries, as the induction furnace
consumes more power for converting the raw material charge to liquid metal. The power
consumption per ton of liquid metal varies depending upon various parameters, viz
1. Furnace power input: Higher the kilowatt of the furnace, lower the power consumption.
The consumption of energy is directly proportional to the power input.
2. Quality of Raw-material: Quality of scrap directly affects the power consumption, rusty
scraps, generates more slag there by increases the power consumption.
3. Physical property of Scrap: The shape of scrap material directly affects the power
consumption, scrap of odd shape occupies more space in the furnace, leaving hollow space
inside the furnace, thereby increases the power consumption. Bundled scrap requires less
time for melting as at a time heavy mass will be inserted inside the furnace leaving no space
in between the scarp, hence power losses would be reduced.
4. Pouring pattern of liquid metal: The pouring sequence also affects the power
consumption, as intermittent pouring leaving gap in between the ladles increases the power
consumption. Un necessary holding of liquid metal inside the furnace increases the power
consumption and the quality of casting also gets affected due to absorption of gas which
creates gas / pin-hole in the castings.
Applying the above parameters on the working of the company, the company has enhanced
the kilowatt of induction furnace from 350kw to 450kw, hence the over all power
consumption has drastically come down when compared to earlier years.The company has
standardized purchase of good quality mild steel and stainless steel scrap from the approved
sources, who supply good quality material.
The company, wherever possible has instructed all its vendors to supply scrap in bundled
condition so that the melting time would be reduced, which would reduce the power
consumption. Apart from this bailing machine costing Rs.5.5 lakhs has been installed to
bundle loose scraps. The Melt plan of the company is meticulously done to reduce
intermittent gap while pouring of metal. Where ever possible entire metal is taken in one
ladle so that the next melt can be started immediately without any delay, thereby reduce the
power consumption.
The table shows the power consumption details over the period of four years. The graph
below shows a clear picture of the decrease in power consumption for melting per ton of
metal. Considerable decrease can be seen after the implementation of lean principles in
production.
Table 6.2: Annual power cost.
2006-2007 2007-2008 2008-2009 2009-2010

TOTAL POWER COST
(in Rs.)
27897292 31837080 27181239 28675005
TOTAL
PRODUCTION(in tons)
2194 2508 2222 2375
POWER COST/TON OF
PRODUCTION(Rs.)
12715 12694 12233 12074
TOTAL SAVINGS FOR
THE YEAR(Rs.)
21 -482 -159
Fig 6.6: Graph for power savings
Chapter 7
Analysis using Lean Tools
7.1 5 Y Analyses
The main tool used by the Malnad Alloy Castings for Lean implementation is WHY
analysis the main theme of this analysis is to keep asking the question WHY? For a problem
until u find the solution. Below are the some data regarding the solutions obtained for some
of the problems with the help of employees by the analysis
1-10-100 rule.
1- To catch and fix problem in the work area.

10-to catch and fix problem after it leaves work area, but before it leaves factory.

100-to catch and fix problem at the customer place.
GAS POROSITY:
Tool to be made for gas vent:
M.s. Plate with rods
Fix nail on pattern (big) and use 6mm pipe for locator (flat and round each on job)
Provide locator on the pattern and release the pattern with the locator only to shop floor for
production.
Gas:
Why gas- improper venting
Why-proper tool not provided
Why-design proper tool and provide the same to shop floor
Solution: Try to procure- paper tubes if available in the size of 6mm 8mm 12mm and 25mm.
Gas 2:
Why-less permeability in sand
Why-high resin content in the mixed sand
Why-why high resin in sand. Why-sand is less in the mixer
Why-sand gate is not opened to the required level
Why-air pressure is not there/lock nut is loose
Why-sluggishness in the movement of piston
Solution: Provide magnetic level switch and proper air pressure
Gas 3:

Why- boiling in the sleeve
Why-moisture in sleeve
Why-sleeve exposed to atmosphere
Why-mould was not poured/kept for long time
Why-liquid metal not available for that particular grade
Why-liquid metal was not prepared as per standard
Solution: Make a standard band for liquid metal
CRACK:
Why-stress due to contraction
Why-restriction for contraction (free space not available)
Why-high strength/poor collapsibility of core
Why-core strength was high
Why-grain size surface area was more
Why-iron oxide percentage was more
Why-iron oxide is not properly weighed
Solution: Prepare a packed suitable for 100kg of sand
Crack below the raiser:
Why: crack below the raiser having large cross sectional area
Why: stress developed while cutting the raiser
Why: variation in temperature at the cutting area
Why: no constant temperature at the cutting area

Solution: Preheat the castings at required temperature and separate the raisers. Heat the
castings and cut while the castings are in hot condition cut top raiser immediately after
knockout.
For crack below the raisers: irrespective of cross sectional area, preheat the castings before
raiser separation.
SAND INCLUSION:
Sand inclusion in smaller casting less than 40kgs:
Why: sand got entered into the casting
Why: loose sand in down spruce
Why: improper ramming of mould
Why: ramming time is not enough
Why: operator is deciding the time of ramming machine is given with foot paddle
Solution: change the foot paddle with timer so that the vibrator switches off automatically.
Monitor mould hardness for 5 melts.
SLAG:
Slag entered into the mould along with liquid metal
Why: slag always floats on the surface of liquid metal
Why: because of low density compared to molten metal
Solution: Always keep molten metal in the ladle above the spout to avoid metal entering the
mould box.
Slag entered in the mould along with liquid metal
Why: there is no restriction to avoid flow of slag to mould
Why: pouring speed is not proper
Why: no standard for pouring speed

Why: swirling action to be created to float the slag on the surface
Solution: Area of spruce should be more than by 1.2times the area of the runners.
Chapter 8
8.1 Major changes done in MACPL after Lean Implementation
 Implementation of Bailing machine worth Rs.5.5lakhs:
Earlier loose scrap was melt in the furnace but now with the help of bailing machine
the loose scrap is squeezed into rectangular boxes which saves the melting time and
increases the capacity of the furnace.
 The furnace lining is reduced by .25 inches keeping in mind the safety factor.
Optimization of the furnace lining thickness has increased the capacity of the furnace
and also the melting time has been reduced considerably. At peak capacity the furnace
could only produce ten melts per day but after add-on’s like squeezed scrap input and
optimization of lining thickness of furnace thirteen melts are possible.
 Earlier scraps was stored in open air without proper shelter but after implementation
of lean shelters are provided for scraps with a concrete partition and ceiling which
cost Rs.50000 protecting it from rain.

 Zigzag movement of casting in the shop floor was the common sight in the foundry
before. After lean implementation Flow concept was adapted and castings are moving
in main two streams after raiser separation:
1. Alloy steel & 2.Stainless Steel
 Grit blasting and Shot blasting machines shifting and revamping cost the company
Rs.1.2lakhs were introduced.
 Raw materials are stored in inventory on the basis of ABC analysis. (which will be
detailed later)
 Increased the size of sand hopper for storing the reclaimed molding sand. The sand
hopper costs Rs.1.2lakhs.
 Fresh molding sand from the storing yard was transported by manual laborers but
after lean implementation overhead pipeline was constructed where the sand from
storage area to the molding section was pumped with the help of compressed air.
Total cost of the entire unit is Rs.5.45lakhs.
 Trolley and trail movement of materials was introduced throughout the shop floor in
the foundry for Rs.75000.
8.2 Capital cost

However such flexibility and ease in services comes at a cost. This may be one time
investment like capital investment paid at bulk sums for once or investments that have to be
made whenever needed. Some of the new equipments and shifting of machinery due to
changes made in re-layouting of the plant will have its financial burden on the company.
Cost Table
Sl.no PARTICULARS Rs in lakhs
1 Roller bed & mold baking oven 3
2 Sand hopper 1.2
3 Sand reclaimer 0.75
4 Bailing machine 5.5
5 Shot blasting (shifting & revamping) 1.2

6 Scrap yard(concrete partition) 0.5
7 Sand storage and transporter(with pipe line) 5.45
8 Trolley and trail movement 0.75
TOTAL 18.35
Rs 18.35 lakhs worth of investment has been made on equipments and a new building worth
Rs.15lakhs has been constructed after implementing lean strategy.

Photo 1: Bailing Machine

Photo 2: Loose Scraps

Photo 3: Grit Blasting Machine

Photo 4: Shot Blasting Machine

Photo 5: Sand Hopper

Photo 6: Baked Molds on roller conveyor.
Chapter 9

Benefits
As per the study of production techniques at Malnad Alloy Castings Pvt Ltd., the
major benefits of implementing lean manufacturing strategies are:
 Rate of over-production is reduced by 34.7%
 Waiting time for a cast component is reduced from 21days to 15days (reduction of
about 40%)
 Re-planning of the plant layout has improved the flow of components around the shop
floor and reduced worker fatigue.
 Re-processing or re-working of the components has reduced considerably from 16.9%

to 8.1%.
 Energy consumed per melt has also been reduced from 620 units to 580 units.
 Storage of excess inventory has been restricted. Storage is restricted to pre-fixed

buffer level needed for continuous production.
 Unproductive motion of workers and components around the plant has been
restrained. Better work cell conditions are being provided.
 Defective products and rejection rate has been decreased from 2.8% to 2.6%.
Chapter 10
Conclusion
The task of this project was to compare the existing production techniques (after lean
implementation) and the techniques used before lean implementation. It shows that certain
techniques such as 5Y, Jidoka, JIT and pull system would help for the betterment of the
productivity of the plant. Primary idea of the project is to help the industries to take new
initiatives such as lean in order to become more competitive in today’s global market.
The study can systematically guide the industries to see the wastes in their value
streams and identify the lean tools that best fit the environment.
The considerable increase in profitability though there has been a reduction in the
yearly turnover is the proof to conclude that lean manufacturing is the ideal manufacturing
strategy. The graphs below depict the statement.
Fig 8.1: Graph for profit

Fig 8.2: Graph for company turnover
The reduction in turnover in 2009-10 has been due to recession and other market
problems but there has been a substantial growth in profit levels. The main contribution to
this has been due to lean and product mix. By this it is now understandable that lean is a
process for all seasons and is not limited to discreet manufacturing environment. It is seen
that lean is an ideal strategy to expose the waste in the production room.
It is now clear that companies now see the need to implement lean to drive their costs
down and become more competitive by reduction of cost, increased customer satisfaction,
reduction of machining downtime, having better and safer workplace.
References
 “LEAN THINKING” by James P. Womack & Daniel T. Jones.
Lean Manufacturing Basics by Aza Badurdeen

 Introduction to Lean Manufacturing by Mekong Capital
 Integrated Lean Thinking & Ergonomics by Jon Walder, Carter Kerk and Jennifer
Karlin. South Dakota School of Mines
Web addresses:
 http://lean.mit.edu/public.
 http://www.toyota.com/html/about/opertions/manufacturing/manu-
locations/tmmk.html.
 http://www.techhelp.org
 http://www.leanmanufacturingconcepts.com





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Lean Manufacturing- a case study at MACPL

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 1

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 2

2.1 What is Lean Manufacturing?

“A systematic approach to identifying and eliminating waste through continuous

2.2 The Principles of Lean Manufacturing

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 3

2.3 Definition Of Work Components

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 4

2.4 The Lean Definition of Waste

 It is anything other than the minimum amount of equipment, materials, parts,

 Necessary activities add Value.

 Unnecessary or wasteful activities add Cost.

2.5 Seven Basic Types of Waste

 Waste from waiting times

 Waste from product defects

2.6 Can all the wastes be avoided?

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 5

o .. wastes that are avoidable

1. Identifying the fact that there are wastes to be removed

3. Finding the solution for these root causes

4. Application of these solutions and achieving the objective

1. Value added and

2. Non value added activities

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 7

3.1 JIT (Just In Time)

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 8

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 9

3.2 JIDOKA- Automation with a human touch

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 10

Although it is simple enough to understand and implement, for an organization to

3.3 5 WHY? Simple but effective

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 11

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 12

 Floor space savings around 30 %( sometimes more than 50%)

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 13

 To obtain a universally applicable method to identify areas of large

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 14

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 15

In the bigger picture, this is equivalent to create a product or a service before it is

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 16

Fig 6.1: Graph of over-production

6.2 Waste from Waiting times

 Causes of Waiting Waste.

 Unbalanced work load & un-level scheduling.

 Long process set-up times.

 Upstream quality problem.

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 18

Fig 6.2: Graph of process time

6.3 Waste of Transportation

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 19

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 20

Fig 6.3: Process flow before lean implementation

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 21

Fig 6.4: process flow after lean implementation

6.4 Processing Waste

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 22

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 23

Fig 6.5: Graph of re-processing

6.5 Inventory Waste

Dept of Mechanical Engineering, JNNCE, Shimoga 24

Maintaining excess inventory of raw materials, parts in process, or finished goods.

 Protects the company from inefficiencies and unexpected problems.

 Unbalanced workload, unleveled scheduling