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Counting On Improved OEE
 While refining its processes, faucet manufacturer Moen Inc. (N. Olmsted, Ohio) ran across a suboptimal situation with its screw machines.
The machines turn metal bar stock into a variety of small internal parts for Moen assemblies. First, the company was unsure of exact output, since the machines, while still highly capable, used older, weight approximation to estimate the count. Second, the equipment had intermittent feed errors as well as fluctuating outages of raw stock—bad feed can mean bad product and, of course, no stock means no product. Moen approached Rockwell Automation to help enhance manufacturing performance management. A critical objective was an absolutely accurate count of the number of parts each screw machine operator produced in a given day, allowing Moen to identify potential problems before they occurred...
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Collaboration is Connecting Plants Inside & Outside
Plants are sharing information with IT, maintenance and along the supply chain. The electronics manufacturing giant, Celestica Inc., of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, has instituted a wide range of collaboration activities to communicate across its 45 plants in Asia, Eastern Europe, Mexico and Canada. The company also collaborates with suppliers and customers to share production data and manage inventory.
Increased regulation in the electronics industry is forcing even greater collaboration, as manufacturers grapple with the demand of European Union directives such as the Registration, Evaluation, Authorization and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) and the Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) directives. REACH and RoHS require companies to declare the substance content of their products. That means they have to manage material data from hundreds—sometimes thousands—of suppliers... Read more
Measuring Return on Automation
When operations managers and engineers evaluate how to improve manufacturing processes, they often look at implementing new or improved automation systems.
After careful studies of the costs of purchasing hardware and software, and adding in the costs of engineering and construction, they are ready to make a request for funds from the business side of the company. It is very likely that they will hear the question, “What is the expected return on this investment?” In fact, if they are unlucky, they may also hear financial management ask questions such as, “As a matter of fact, while we're on this subject, just what has been the return on all the automation that we've bought over the last five years?”...Read more
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