P
lanning Success story
involved, the hundreds of spreadsheets used Planning working together. The opinion was Preactor from the ERP system immediately
to generate the plan struggled with the task. that any scheduling had to work with finite after an overnight update of the ERP data.
“Some of these spreadsheets were very capacity and be able to adapt to the ongoing Shortage data is flagged up by due date
clever, but at the end of the day they were changes in workflow that moving towards a from the ERP system and a master schedule
still spreadsheets,” said Hancock. “In some Leaner model of manufacturing might entail. generated, which automatically sequences
cases, a single spreadsheet might take 30 all jobs taking this into account thereby
minutes to open due to the number of creating a top-level plan. This is then
embedded macros.” Therefore, generating a In-depth implementation exported to each local Preactor system
schedule could take days rather than hours; where relevant fine tuning is performed
and even then it could be out of date before In June 2007, the decision was therefore before being distributed to the shop floor
being distributed effectively across the made to invest in a Preactor Enterprise in the form of Work-To lists. All updated
production floor. “Not only did we struggle system that provides 5 local area schedules information is fed back into the ERP system,
with control of the schedule, we couldn’t and one master schedule. What followed which is then used to generate the next
compare actual progress on the production was an in-depth implementation period schedule when required.
floor with the projected schedule,” continued lasting 6 months, during which all existing
Hancock. “Consequently our Capable to business data had to be extracted from Perhaps the most immediate saving was
Promise/Make to Promise dates were very the company’s existing spreadsheets and an £8000-per-week reduction in costs in
poor. We’d often have to take 3 to 4 attempts ERP system and entered into Preactor. the Vacuum Forming section alone due
to get an accurate CTP/MTP date.” The most time consuming work however to more efficient workflow and better
lay in compiling all the data that didn’t exist resource utilisation. Not only can bottlenecks
Aware of the problems, the company had systemically in order to generate accurate now be correctly identified, they have
already invested in a planning & scheduling Bills of Materials and routing information that now been addressed as part of the overall
solution that it had hoped to integrate with its could cope with products of this complexity increase in visibility that Preactor has
existing ERP system. However, this floundered extending over 2 sites. brought. Hancock estimates that Preactor
at the pilot stage and never got off the ground. has directly contributed to a general
A dedicated Lean facilitator was then appointed, Some 6 months later, the information flow at increase in output of 10 per cent with
who represented the management’s view that Contour was very different. All relevant data a corresponding WIP reduction of
the best way forward was to have Lean and is now imported on a weekly basis into approximately 40 per cent. circlesolid
www.logisticsit.com
MANUFACTURING
March 2009 &LOGISTICSIT
23
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56