5V Concept for Improving Plant Efficiency
The industries all over the world are feeling the double pinch from the economic downturn and
increased energy prices now is the time to introduce cost-saving measures. But such
actions necessarily have to involve an increase in operational efficiency of manufacturing
plant or service sector.
To increase the plant efficiency we should focus both on its broader as well as detailed Factors.
Keeping this in mind we have discovered the term “5V”.These 5V starts with a broader
perspective and carries on with a narrower one of continual improvement and better
control measures. It took into account the concept of Lean Six Sigma Application into
practice.
Now we start with 5V concept
1) Voice of Customer (VOC):
Voice of customer helps us in determining the function-cost relationship of a product. It helps
us in understanding the said and unsaid need of the customer in a better way. VOC can be
obtained through many sources like surveys; Online feed back, QFD Analysis. But for
Better plant efficiency its not only the voice of customer who is buying our product, the
customer can be next succeeding process or department.
For example: Suppose through VOC we got a demand of producing 10 lakhs Mobile sets per
month with certain specific features.
This will decide the tact time at which the product will be manufactured in the company.
Suppose the tact time comes out to be 5 sec for an Assembly line. To meet this
Production Rate we should take the voice of all departments in achieving this pace. Their
problems, Limitation of the machines, Manpower requirement, Resource Planning (MRP-
I and MRP-II) to be done, Feedback and suggestion from workers shall surely be
incorporated in the planning action on VOC.
2) Value Addition:
Before going through This; I shall ask you one question “How will you define Value”
The answers given may differ from persons to persons. Value is a relative term; Value is not
price or cost of the product. Value can be functional, social And Aesthetical. This can be
clearer if you all remember the days when you went fro your first degree examination and
your father gifted you a pen. The price of the pen may be $1 but its value is priceless for
you.
Value can numerically be termed as
Value: Function/Cost
To explain this I cite one example:
Suppose there is a company A who is into the business of manufacturing mobiles.
Suppose the cost of mobile is $50 And Having features like .Stereo Fm, Torch light,10 Hour
talk time. In order to increase the features company can provide Bluetooth, better
appearance etc.
Company-A
Function Cost
Case-1 Same Less
Case-2 More Same
Case-3 More Less
So in order to increase the value of the mobile the company can go through as shown in table.
That means to increase value of a product you need not just cut down its cost but can
imply some other strategies also.
So we can divided the manufacturing activity into two categories
1)Value Added Activity(VA)
2)Non Value Added(NVA)
Value added activity are those activities for which customer are paying to the company,Rest all
activity we do is waste or NVA .In general Around 80% activity we do for manufacturing a
product is NVA and 20% is VA.
For example: if we consider fixing the table top with screws, the following will be the process
a) Bring the table top
b) Keep it on table
c) Take the screw
d) Fix it on screwdriver
e) Fix the screw on table and screwing
From the activity given above only the activity ‘e’ is VA because here only the actual work is
being done
So for increasing the efficiency of the plant, one should aim at reducing the percentage of NVA
and increasing VA ratio.
In a manufacturing plant there are seven types of wastes which can easily be remember with the
cue “TIM WOOD”
Transportation
Inventory
Motion
Waiting
Over production
Over processing
Defect .
3)Value Stream Mapping:
Value Stream Mapping is a very important tool used by companies to create a material and
information flow map of a product or processes. This powerful tool allows companies to
map the flow of products in the back door as raw material, Procurement cycle, lead time
through all manufacturing process steps, and off the loading dock as finished product.
This is the Value Stream. You start with the current state map - it shows you where you
are. Then, you plan you lean journey with a future state map - it shows you where you’re
going and how you’re going to get there. Based on your Value Stream Map, you can
streamline work processes, thereby cutting lead times, increasing efficiency and reducing
operating costs.
CaseStudy:
Consider The process for an Example of An e-publishing company who is into the business of
type-setting the articles for journals and research papers.
To start with make a Present state Value stream as shown in figure given below:
We map the various processes, their cycle time, time taken for transportation, Storage or delay
[Link] of these value added (VA) time is the time taken when actual keying coding is
[Link] time is 3600 [Link] is the VA activity.
Total time taken = 10170 sec
VA time = 3600 sec
NVA= Total Time-VA time= 6570 sec
Client PDF
Server
So in the Future Value stream mapping we will consider the areas for improvement marked in
Red for easy understanding. We will eliminate this activity as taking print is not
required,Only soft copy can serve the purpose. Also Keying coding can be divided into
two activtes and one program developed to auto run Optical character reader. This will
save the Cycle time And collectively the TAT(Turn around time) will be reduced.
LOGIN EP
Print list Downlo
LOGIN EP
Print list Auto
E-Publishing company lean initiative so far has managed to reduce NVA By 31% and save a
projected $5,000 in paperwork each year. They expect even more results Downlo
as they
implement lean company-wide
ad
After
The Symbols used generally For VSM are shown in figure given below:
articles
300
4) Variation Zero: 30 120
One defective product is equal to the loss of three good products being manufactured. defect
arises from various sources like Incoming material quality not meeting the specified standards,
machine worn out leads to defect, variation in skill level of worker can also produce a poor
CYCLE TIME (sec)= 6930
quality product. So this is all because there has begun variations in the processes .Variation can
occur due to natural cause or due to assignable causes. No process can be such that it runs
without variation on its own. But methodology like Six Sigma., SQC, Kanban can help in
keeping a check over this variation. Continuous monitoring of processes through control charts
Reduction in:
to track the process under control, Six sigma and Kaizen to reduce the defects. Use of written
process like Work instruction, Visual manual to help operators to work in a standard manner to
Cycle Time (sec) =
reduce variation due to their work man ship. Poka-yoke or mistake proofing systems should be
applied to prevent Defects to pass from them.
For example:
Cycle Time (Min) =
1) Vision machine Used in SMD lines has a standard picture of the PCB, As soon as PCB
NVA (%) =
comes below the camera of Vision machine, it compares with the standard picture, if
some abnormality found. it will show an error and machine will give alarm and stop
functioning.
2) Weighing Machine used as a mistake proofing system for preventing Accessory mistake
proofing in TV boxes.
5) Visual Management:
The last “V” stands for Visual management. Visual management means every thing shall be
controlled by visually over viewing of the production system.
This includes a better house keeping following 5S. This will provide a healthy work
environment for operators and help in increasing manpower efficiency. An untidy environment
degrades not only the quality of good produced but degrades the motivation level of employees
working there.
Visual management has a very important role in controlling the production efficiency.
For example: There is a production monitoring software system that is displayed every where
on shop floor. So every one working can get to know the status of all the assembly line
working. In this example there are 2 lines A &B whose targets at a particular time was 100 and
125 respectively. But they have achieved 70 and 65 quantity. The system gets refreshed after
every five minutes and displays the targeted quantity at that particular instant. So it can be seen
by the management that targets are not achieved
The operator working will always have the pinch that their line is going behind the targets.
The quality people shall focus on defects levels. So in this way a model history can also be
managed for better operation for the next time
Date:7/1/2010 Time 9:30 a.m.
Line AA BB
Model AA-123 BB-345
Target 100 125
Production 70 65
Productivity 70% 52%
Defect 5000ppm 4600ppm
So overall a better visually controlled manufacturing system can be established for better
efficiency.