Case Study: High Voltage Switch Gear Producer

High Voltage Switch Gear – Low Volume Producer – Kanban/SMED/Lead Time

NSW based, this medium size business has been manufacturing HV switch gear for over 20 years. Quoting and delivering to a lead time of 12 weeks, however it was struggle to deliver based on centralized scheduling system. They had started lean concepts like one piece flow in their assembly lines but are struggling to link the stand alone processes. Their academic knowledge suggests Kanban might help. Press shop is chosen as pilot project for introduction of Kanban with our involvement at initial stage. A further study of current practices showed, SMED would be the right start, as set up time reduction is vital to low volume Kanban introduction.

First step was the training in set up time reduction (SMED). Five people including hand-on staff were trained in the SMED methodolgy, starting with a three hour class room session. Results- 6 hours set up time is reduced to 15 minutes, with negligible investment. This got the team excited and involved in next stage improvement cycle on hand. Kanban is introduced with assembly line pulling parts from press shop as needed, press shop starts dealing with sub contractors, an outside electro-plater without purchasing/stores getting involved in day to day work progress. All the issues involved with getting parts to assembly start to disappear.This was then extended to other parts such as fasteners and fabricated parts being bought from three different suppliers.

Results:

• Lead time down to 4W (from 12W).
• Internal relationships improved considerably.
• Better service level will to lock the customer in for the long haul.