The Production Of Lean Manufacture And How It Can Be Applied Within A Manufacturing Environment Essay

Henry Ford and the assembly line is a man and a manufacturing process that will go down in history. Henry Ford was the inventor of the assembly line. The assembly line is a process in which parts are added as the semi finished assembly moves from work station to work station. The parts are then added in sequence until the final assembly is produced. This process was a creation that changed the world.

One of the biggest needs for improvement was the assembly process. Although several changes were made throughout the years, quality and efficiency still fell below expectations. Hinrichs implemented the newly developed assembly which consists of two separate work stations that allowed operators in the adjacent stations to share the expensive balancer machine. These assembly cells were much more efficient as workers were no longer forced to wait for another person or machine in the process. Each cell was built like the other with quick turn set-up which created flexibility in the process while also reducing tooling inventory by almost a half. Now cells

“With one workman doing a complete job he could turn out from thirty-five to forty pieces in a nine-hour day, or about twenty minutes to an assembly. What he did alone was then spread into twenty-nine operations; that cut down the assembly time to thirteen minutes” (Ford, 45). Ford had nearly cut the production time of one Ford Model T in half, allowing for more automobiles to be produced in a day. The Ford Motor Company was able to produce 150 Ford Model Ts every day and eventually reached nearly 10,000 Model Ts a day by 1925 (Sandler, 21). Each worker would contribute his skill at assembling a single part of the Model T, and once he completed his task he would pass the Model T on to the next worker in line along the assembly line, similar to the meat production factory in which Ford envisioned his idea. His idea soon caught on and became an idealistic way to mass produce products in America which soon caught on to other industries and continued to inspire the ways Americans would produce goods even to this day.

(The graphic shows the mass production rate of cars by using an assembly line that could have required a larger work force) (Document 4). One method to manufacture a product that became very popular is the assembly line which made the rate of production per person much greater. It required

A product would be sent to a worker who would perform a certain task and then moved on to another worker who would perform a different task. The idea was that all of the employees would have their own individual tasks to perform on one product to increase production speed and efficiency. The assembly line was first used and perfected in the automobile industry by Henry Ford. This sparked a rise in automobile sales which ultimately changed how people lived their day

He had his workers work less, with more breaks, and he also payed them almost twice as much as other jobs. As Eric Foner states, “Ford paid the assembly line workers $5 a day when prevailing wages were about $2.50...he also reduced working hours to 8.” With this, workers were more likely to work harder and better, which led to more productivity. The productivity was not done alone, the infrastructure of the assembly line is very critical to the production process. This was done by, as Robert Sobel states,” ...conveyor belts in the assembly line that brought parts to the workers to perform their specific task.” All this improved the production rate and it satisfied the workers. Many may say the assembly line removed individuality, however it brought faster, better, and cheaper production to the Ford Motor Company.

Lean manufacturing is the production of goods using less of everything than in mass production: less human effort, less manufacturing space, less investment tools and less engineering time to develop a new product. A company becomes lean by continuously increasing its capacity to produce high-quality goods while

In the era of consumerism, abundance of essential products is critical to supply the high demands. This would have been very difficult without Henry Ford and his excellence in operating the assembly line. Assembly line is one of the most reliable and durable production techniques ever invented. In the 20th century, assembly line was amongst one of the most remarkable technological advancements. Nearly all the products that we use nowadays, we would not have it in the amount we need and at the prices we have it without the assembly line. The assembly line has played a major role in modifying the world and it is the main force behind every industry on earth. The use of assembly line in industries such as automotive, arms, and food has played a key role in supplying the world with essential products while minimizing the total cost. The operation of assembly line in various industries has assisted the world in providing crucial products that we need to make our lives easier.

Ford realized that he must change his methods of production in order to decrease the price of his automobiles. His invention of the assembly line actually started before the Model T came out, but Ford did not know it at the time. The Model N was built prior to the Model T. The workers on the Model N automobiles placed the parts in order along the floor while the “under-construction” auto was on skids and moved down the line. The workers placed their respective parts on the machine as it passed by. For the Model T, Ford tried to make his process even better. He broke the assembly process into 84 small steps. On top of this, workers were trained for only one of the 84 steps. By having a machine that could make interchangeable parts faster than any human, the process accelerated quickly and there was no shortage on supplies. With the combination of the new parts machine, line of workers trained per step, and an order of parts, the assembly line was born. Figure 1 below shows the wheels and hubcaps of Model T cars being assembled using the assembly line. The excessive amounts

Production practices have had an important role in satisfying the dynamic market. Many approaches have being developed in order to respond effectively to specific business requirements. In fact, some areas of management have focused its study on the overseeing, designing, and controlling the process of production in an effort to find the best methodology that ensures the business success and performance. However, complexities arise in this field because many variables such as costs, inventory, scheduling, suppliers, etc have to be considered in any business. Lean approach and the traditional approach are two points of view that aim to address this complexities, and those will be examined in this essay.

This essay is going to analyze a case study based on lean thinking principles and techniques. It is could divide in four significant parts. First, to outline the definitions of Lean manufacturing philosophy and applied the strategies to achieving, next create future state Value Stream Map, Furthermore justification Lean Six Sigma tools and techniques, which would appropriate, and critically discussed the key successful should his idea to the Evenort Company.

The operational systems of organizations can be viewed as open systems, which interact with their respective environments on a continuous basis. In this context, these systems comprise synergetic and interdependent subsystems of input, process and output with the main objective of these systems being to efficiently and effectively deliver goods and/or services to their demanding customers (Yasin and Wafa, 2002). Confronting the challenges of global competition, companies have to reduce costs, improve quality, and meet their customers’ ever-changing needs (Canel et al., 2000). Even though lean techniques were developed for the manufacturing firms and

Initially at Ford motors, production used to take place by keeping the vehicle at one position and making the workers move in and about gathering the several parts together. This method unfortunately was a very tedious and time-consuming process. In view of this fact, Henry Ford appointed Taylor to monitor the operations taking place. Ford applied the scientific management

The use of assembly lines for faster production played a major part in the Industrial Revolution since the strategy generated large profits for the factory owners. Assembly lines were used in the Ford Company which was the practice of moving the work from one worker to another until the product was finished (Nardo, United States 63). The strategy was shown to be very efficient and fast. For example, in 1909, Ford was making almost 11,000 Model Ts compared to the 65 cars the company had been building each year before assembly lines were used. In 1910, almost 19,000 Model Ts were built (Evans 18). A year after Ford’s introducing the assembly line, the amount of time to assemble a car reduced from 12 hours and 28 minutes to two hours and 38 minutes. After another year, the production time dropped to an hour and 33 minutes (DiBacco 125). By 1914, a car was coming down the assembly line every 40 seconds (Evans 19). Ford not only made millions of cars by 1920, but he also had spectacular sales. In 1916, Ford made and sold 739,000 Model Ts, which was half of all new cars made in the US (Nardo, United States 63). Assembly lines would later be used in other companies who hoped to bring a similar success rate in mass production and in sales as Ford did.

This synthesised, scientifically managed workflow was meant to improve labour productivity and economic efficiency. And thirdly, rather than having machinery at the centre of the factory and workers moving to and from the product, assembly lines were used. This meant that the workers remained stationary and the product simply flowed past them (Murray, 1989). They were essentially treated as robots and dictated by machines; operating to the duplicated, repetitive tasks daily and not given the opportunity to express potential for advancement or improvement.