The customer takt represents the demand of your customers for your your products. The line takt represents the ability of your production system to produce. Hence, the customer takt should meet the line takt. This series of blog posts looks into what to do if they do NOT match. In my previous post I talked about small fluctuations… which are pretty much no problem in the short term, as inventory (for make-to-stock) or lead time and utilization (for make-to-order) will handle these. However, if the fluctuations trend in one or another direction, eventually you have to act. In this post I will talk more about what to do if the customer takt is faster than your line takt (i.e., the customer demand exceeds your current capacity).
Takt
What If Your Customer Takt and Your System Takt Do Not Match—Small Fluctuations
One of the key parameters for setting up and running any production system is the customer takt (i.e., the customer demand). This is measured as the average time between the demand of a customer for one product, based on the available working time. In the grand picture, the customer takt (the customer demand) should match the line takt (the production speed of the line). But what should you do if it doesn’t? Let’s investigate this in a small series of posts. This first post looks at small fluctuations.
Hard Math in Lean: Selected Equations
I am a scientist, and I try to understand how the world works, particularly in my field of manufacturing and lean production. (I also try to teach others about this, e.g., through this blog.) Hence, in this post I will look at different equations used in lean. Somehow, there are not that many…
On the Value of Time in Manufacturing—Cyclic Work
Time is money. One goal in lean is to reduce the time needed to do the work by eliminating waste (muda, which is the better-known part of reducing time) and fluctuations (mura, which many people skip over because it is more difficult, but also more powerful). However, not all time is equal. Reducing the time needed to do the work saves labor cost, but depending on where you save the time, you may have many more additional benefits. Let’s have a look.