Improvement in Line feeding System in Assembly Plant using Lean Manufacturing Techniques

Abstract

Today in automobile manufacturing firms the variety of customer demands influence the material flow in the plant. This material flow affects the ability to achieve the production targets. This requires logistics systems that can support production in small lot sizes as discussed in the case study here. Since continuous material feeding systems resulted in increased operator walk and search time an attempt to increase production throughput is made. In this paper best line feeding systems are implemented to support assembly line production systems to reduce the downtime at assembly line due to material shortage. The data is collected for downtime due to material shortage from each assembly line and analyzed for effects on production time. Time study is carried out to determine value added and non-value added activities and reduced them. Model station analysis has been performed on Booster assembly line to find out the suitable material feeding system using lean manufacturing through value stream mapping. Hence continuous supply system has been replaced by lean supply kitting system which resulted in reduced assembly line downtime, reduction in material flow lead time by 28.55% and reducing non value added activities by 11.91% in existing assembly line without any additional investments.