Air Plane Game Exercise - Flow, Line balancing, Kaizen

Inseong Kim

Game

• Exercise objectives and purpose Create the Standardized work and understand why the STD work is critical to

Quality, Safety and productivity

Understand how we can link the STD work with operator balancing and Kaizen activities

• What Paper air plane game

• Where

In the training room

• How 4 rounds

See detailed roles on next page

Reflections by the teams

• Results KPIs evolution from round 1 to 4

Lay out and Preparations

Work station

4

Work station

3

Work station

2

Work station

1

Team

leader

Material

handler

- A4 Paper - White, Yellow

- Label – Buffer, Law material

- Waste basket (Paper cup)

- Scissors

- Jigs, Raw material to make jigs

- Stop watch

- Scale (30 cm)

- Marker pens

- STD work document templates

- Flip chart (Metrics print)

Lay out

Preparations

Finished

goods

Roles

1 Material handler : Trainer can be a material handler

– Responsible to feed the line with raw material from the warehouse.

4 Operators – Responsible to assemble according to the assembly instruction on each station

– Responsible to improve SQDC at own work station through Idea suggestion & Kaizen

1 Team leader / Supervisor – Responsible to observe any difficulties and problems at the assembly stations

– Responsible to measure the cycle time by element each operator

– Responsible to drive Kaizen activity to improve SQDC

1 PDI inspector : Trainer can be a material handler

– Responsible for inspect any quality problems before delivering the finished goods to customer

– Count the # of good parts and defected parts

Folding Process

Job allocation -Round1 & Round2

•Operator 1 : ① •Operator 2 : ②~⑥ •Operator 3 : ⑦~⑩ •Operator 4 : ⑪~⑭

1 2 3 4 5

6 7 8 9 10

11 12 13 14

Timings

Time Items Tasks

0:25 Game Introduction

0:10 Build Practice

0:10 Round 1 - Flow processing with Push -Create STD work

-Measure the cycle time

0:20 Metrics & 1st Kaizen -Introduce pull

0:10 Round 2 - Flow processing with Pull

0:30 Metrics & 2nd Kaizen -Introduce operator balancing

0:15 Coffee

0:10 Round 3 - Flow processing with Pull &

operator balancing

0:40 Metrics & 3rd Kaizen -Introduce/improve tools/jigs

0:10 Round 4 - Flow processing with Pull,

operator balancing and improve tools/jigs

0:30 Metrics & Update STD work -Update STD work

0:30 Reflection by team Total productivity improvement

4:00 Tot End

Inspection specification

• Good visual quality

• Mismatch allowance : ± 2 mm

• Cutting tolerance : ± 2 mm

Width 15 mm ± 3 mm & Height 15 mm ± 3 mm

20 ± 3 mm

Metrics

No Metrics Round 1

-Push

Round 2 -Pull

Round 3 -Balancing

Round 4 -Tools/Jigs

1 Delivered Quantity (Total trucks delivered)

2 Good Parts (Total parts green OK)

3 % Green OK

4 Work In Process (Raw material +Buffer + SWIP)

5 Lead Time (Sec)

6 # of operators 4 4 4 4

7 Time (Min) 8 8 8 8

8 Productivity (Good parts/% of operator/Time)

Round 1 - Flow processing with Push

Work station 4 Work station 3 Work station 2 Work station 1

Team

leader

Material

handler

Finished

goods Law

material

Rule

• Material handler - Feed the raw material (A4 paper-white) : 10 sheets for one delivery

- Feed the yellow A4 paper in 3 minutes to measure manufacturing lead time

• Operator - Continue to work if there are materials available

- Possible to rest or play with smart phone if there are no WIPs

• Inspector : Check/count defected parts & feedback to team leader/operators

• Team leader - Measure cycle time and Create Standardized work

- Evaluate team metrics results and communicate with operators

• FIFO : All materials should be kept the FIFO rule between processes

• 8 Min • Use Scissors &

waste basket

Round 1 - Flow processing with Push

Push system : Supplier push the customer to accept their product

Inventory is unlimited

Inventory is increasing

Manufacturing lead time is too long

Big bottle neck operation

Other operator need to wait

Waiting = Waste

Unbalanced line between operators = Waste

Something is not right = Waste

• Problems & Improvement opportunity

Round 2 - Flow processing with Pull

Work station 4 Work station 3 Work station 2 Work station 1

Team

leader

Material

handler

Finished

goods

Buffer Buffer Buffer Mat’l

Bin 1

Mat’l

Bin 2

Rule

• Material handler - Feed the raw material (A4 paper-white) with 2-bin concept

- Feed the yellow A4 paper in 3 minutes to measure manufacturing lead time

• Operator - Work only if there is no WIP in buffer

- Possible to rest or play with smart phone if there are no WIPs

• Inspector : Check/count defected parts & feedback to team leader/operators

• Team leader - Evaluate team metrics results and communicate with operators

• 8 Min • Use buffer label

Round 2 - Flow processing with Pull

Pull system : Customer pull the product from supplier when needed

More control of inventory

More organized work place

• Improvements

But there is still lot to improve

The product does not met the demand. Now where is the problem?

The line is not balanced.

- Operator 2 and 4 are doing a lot more work than others

But this time, the problem is because the line is not balanced. By balancing

it, it can solve the problem!

• Further Improvement opportunity

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

1st Op 2nd Op 3rd Op 4th Op 1st Op 2nd Op 3rd Op 4th Op

Operator Balance Chart / Yamazumi chart

Round 3 - Flow processing with Pull & Operator balancing

Work station 4 Work station 3 Work station 2 Work station 1

Team

leader

Material

handler

Finished

goods

8 Min

Buffer Buffer Buffer Mat’l

Bin 1

Mat’l

Bin 2

Rule – Same as Round 2

• But the workload is properly balanced / divided to stabilize process with balancing

• Material handler - Feed the raw material (A4 paper-white) with 2-bin concept

- Feed the yellow A4 paper in 3 minutes to measure manufacturing lead time

• Operator - Work only if there is no WIP in buffer

- Possible to rest or play with smart phone if there are no WIPs

• Inspector : Check/count defected parts & feedback to team leader/operators

• Team leader - Evaluate team metrics results and communicate with operators

Round 3 - Flow processing with Pull & Operator balancing

Operator balancing

- The workload is properly balanced and divided to stabilize process

Shorter lead time with “QRPS” problem solving

• Improvements

But there is still lot to improve

- need to improved the quality

- need to reduce the cycle time

• Further Improvement opportunity

Round 4 -Flow processing with Pull, operator balancing & tools/jigs

Work station 4 Work station 3 Work station 2 Work station 1

Team

leader

Material

handler

Finished

goods

8 Min

Buffer Buffer Buffer Mat’l

Bin 1

Mat’l

Bin 2

Rule – Same as Round 3

• But new tools & jigs are used to improve quality & reduce cycle time

• Material handler - Feed the raw material (A4 paper-white) with 2-bin concept

- Feed the yellow A4 paper in 3 minutes to measure manufacturing lead time

• Operator - Work only if there is no WIP in buffer

- Possible to rest or play with smart phone if there are no WIPs

• Inspector : Check/count defected parts & feedback to team leader/operators

• Team leader - Evaluate team metrics results and communicate with operators

Operator Balance Chart

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

1st Op 2nd Op 3rd Op 4th Op 1st Op 2nd Op 3rd Op 4th Op

Jigs

Reference

• Half folding jigs • Wing folding jigs

• Cutting jigs…

Metrics

No Metrics Round 1

-Push

Round 2 -Pull

Round 3 -Balancing

Round 4 -Tools/Jigs

1 Delivered Quantity (Total trucks delivered)

10 12 14 15

2 Good Parts (Total parts green OK)

7 9 11 15

3 % Green OK 70% 75% 79% 100%

4 Work In Process (Raw material +Buffer + SWIP)

57 9 9 9

5 Lead Time (Sec) 75 65 62 56

6 # of operators 4 4 4 4

7 Time (Sec) 8 8 8 8

8 Productivity (Good parts/% of operator/Time)