Figure 2: What is 5-S?


Figure 1: Large Shaw Process Ceramic Patterns for Casting


ceramic molds are too large to be set into typical furnaces, so the molds, after volatiles have cooked off, are set under gas burners to harden. During hardening microscopic cracks are formed in the molds which allow gases to escape but will still hold metal flowing into the molds during the casting operation. BIMAC’s


legacy Shaw ceramic mold


process was originally installed and still primarily serves our key legacy customer Kadant Black Clawson.


Start with The Customer Kadant Black Clawson is a global company whose North


American


business is focused on manufacturing paper recycling machines for papermills in the U.S. Therefore, their target market is paper-pulp locations in the Southwest and Northeast of this continent. Since many castings for Kadant Black Clawson are sourced and imported from Asia, they are open to reevaluating some of their sourcing strategies. Since our old Shaw ceramic mold process primarily serves this legacy customer Kadant Black Clawson, this internal work center with


® Figure 4: Activity in Kaizen Ceramic Mold Work Center


a direct customer connection became a crucial decision point of “where to start.” BIMAC’s start using Lean is intended to gain more business from Black Clawson with an internal improvement goal of 100% delivery performance at 50% shorter lead time. In turn, Kadant may be


in a better position to provide improved service during scheduled maintenance for reducing downtime for continuous running North American paper mills and pulp recycling machines. We all have Amazon boxes to recycle!


Continued on pg 36 August 2023 ❘ 35


Figure 3: Target Area for Improvement: Ceramic Mold Work Center


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  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72