Five Lean Principles of Manufacturing
Have you ever heard or read about the term lean manufacturing?
If you are an engineer and that too involved in the manufacturing process then you might turn thumbs up for the term. Also, you would be familiar with the term “lean principles”.
If you are not aware of lean manufacturing and lean principles, continue reading and boost up your knowledge with the tetrahedron, one of the best providers of lean manufacturing in India.
Coming to the first thing, Lean manufacturing can be simply considered as a methodology to reduce the waste in the manufacturing system without making any sacrifice for productivity. Also, it could be stated in other terms to increase efficiency by cutting the waste whilst ensuring the quality of the manufacturing process.
Before we jump over to the lean principles, one of the most crucial and important things to be learned about lean manufacturing is the lean manufacturing house. For any production system the major three categories of problems faces are:
- Waste ( Muda)
- Variability ( Mura)
These three problems all together affect the productivity, product quality, and efficiency of the system. Thus a production business faces decreased ROI. The founders of lean manufacturing have developed lean house as a symbolic representation of lean principles and how do these principles co-exist
The basic root of the lean house is stability. The overall motive of the lean house is to standardize the work methods and monitor the strategy for increased efficiency and reduced waste in the production process. The base of the house is made up of two major elements over which the entire house is made upon:
- Reduction of Muda
- Kaizen ( Continous improvement)
Next, we have two pillars of the lean house –
The two pillars are based on:
- Heijunka– This refers to sequenced and linear production
- Standardized work– A systematically designed production system that can manage sudden demand fluctuations
The walls of the house are made up of tools to provide support to the roof of the house. The tools are :
Pulled flow, Talk time, and continuous flow- for the JIT pillar
Man-machine separation and automation – For the JIDOKA pillar
The roof of the house can be summarized as:
CQD- Reduced Costs, Improved Quality, and matched Delivery times
With tetrahedron lean manufacturing consultants, a manufacturing house can get better and improvised lean manufacturing for the firm. Also, it is important to learn about the basic lean principles of the manufacturing system.
Lean principles are made with the objective of eliminating waste. When lean manufacturing is operated correctly then one can make huge improvements in efficiency and increase productivity as well. The Five lean principles that can help you to eliminate the waste to possible zero and enhance the efficiency areas:
- Value– This is decided by aligning with customer needs and requirements. It is important to consider all the things, like time of delivery, manufacturing cost, expectations of customers met or not, etc.
- Value stream– After deciding the value, mapping the value stream is the next step. This includes all the steps that are involved in the making of the final product. Right from collecting the raw material to delivering the final packaged product, all the processes are mapped. This is what helps to eradicate the processes and the steps that create waste during the process. The business operation is understood in a better manner with this and this is also sometimes termed as the process re-engineering.
- Flow– Once the waste has been eradicated; the other remaining process must be smooth. This simply means that no delays, no interruptions, and no bottlenecks in product manufacturing. To get a smooth flow, it is important that you design the value-creating steps in the right and strict sequence so that the efficiency is maximum.
- Pull– Now once the manufacturing is smooth, the next crucial thing is to be available to customers on time. The easier it is for customers to pull the products from you, the more would be the market. Also, the stockpiling problem would never arrive if the pull is managed properly.
- Perfection– Though you have completed all of the steps properly this is the most important which cannot be ignored. At this point, it is important to understand that the lean system is not static. You need constantly to make efforts and vigilance to perfect.
With lean manufacturing, customers also realize the improvements and they might get likely to be part of your system. You can learn how to implement lean principles with lean manufacturing training.
Tetrahedron being one of the fastest-growing and renowned manufacturing consulting services in India provides you the best services.
For more details: https://www.tetrahedron.in/manufacturing-excellence/