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More than 13 hours per week creating documents and nearly seven hours per week organizing documents are common among small and midsize engineer-to-order (ETO) manufacturers; four hours per week are spent managing document routing and another 10 hours per week searching for information. All this…
On December 29, 2006, passengers of American Airlines’ Flight 1348 were confined in a parked aircraft for eight hours. By this time, “The toilets on the American Airlines jet were overflowing. There was no water to be found and no food except for a box of pretzel bags.” This fiasco was…
Last month, I talked about vision vs. video and brought up the possibility of confusion between inspection and measurement. Some think that inspection is qualitative and measurement is quantitative. I can’t say I’ll put the matter to rest, but I’ll present a few different…
How do we conclude that a nagging, recurring blip has become serious enough to justify taking action? How do we assess the significance of anomalies—isolated occurrences and scattered, seemingly unrelated events? Can we objectively distinguish those factors that suggest an escalating…
In a previous column, we discussed the importance of the IECQ quality assessment systems for electronic components, a certification scheme of the International Electrotechnical Commission. The IECQ mission is to provide a business-to-business quality certification scheme that serves industry by…
Last year I had the good fortune of doing some consulting with B&C Specialty Products in Hopeulikit, Georgia. B&C does light manufacturing, primarily plastic molding and assembly, and they also distribute imported products produced by companies in the Far East. They have about…
For the last Brain Teaser, in an interesting spin, sample size was defined as a time window. A is the correct response. The underlying data type falls into the category of defect counts (complaints) within a constant area of opportunity (one hour). These data, of course, follow the…
Businesses have lately been focusing on profit and process improvement. However, profit improvement at any cost to make the upcoming quarter look bright has a price. It appears that most improvement effort leads with efficiency measured by head-count reduction. Improvement shouldn’t be measured by…
This column normally originates from the hammock in the woods behind our home. With almost a foot of snow on the ground, though, this month’s contribution would better be titled “Thoughts From a Lounge Chair in My Den.” So, while sitting in my favorite chair and listening to the popping of…
This column normally originates from the hammock in the woods behind our home. With almost a foot of snow on the ground, though, this month’s contribution would better be titled “Thoughts From a Lounge Chair in My Den.” So, while sitting in my favorite chair and listening to the popping of…
Research engineer Phil Santangelo works in professor Gang Bao’s cell culture facility in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Tech and Emory University in Atlanta. Photo courtesy of: Phil Santangelo…
Established in 1903, the Harley-Davidson Motor Company grew rapidly during the two world wars. Foreign competition hit the industry early, and by 1953 Harley-Davidson was the last remaining major motorcycle manufacturer in the United States. Harley was bought by AMF in 1969 and by the late…
We are more than halfway through the countdown of our exploration of the kooky, and expensive, mistakes people make in implementing Six Sigma, and I want to talk about something that’s so fundamental people rarely see it—Stupid Six Sigma Trick #4: Overusing DMAIC.
DMAIC stands for define the…
A certain company has a complaint department that answers calls for three unique products. Because of failure rates inherent to each product type, some products have a higher expected complaint rate than others. Calls are tallied each hour and categorized by product type…
Dairy plants are among the heaviest users of municipal water in the United States, using two gallons of water for every gallon of consumer product produced. The clean-in-place (CIP) systems that daily wash and sanitize every truck, tank, pipe and surface in the plant use the greatest amount of that…
Dairy plants are among the heaviest users of municipal water in the United States, using two gallons of water for every gallon of consumer product produced. The clean-in-place (CIP) systems that daily wash and sanitize every truck, tank, pipe and surface in the plant use the greatest amount of that…
Using the eye is visual. The use of magnified imaging by eye or with a camera is a common part of manufacturing. Some of that use is for inspection. Some is for measurement. Some is online. Some is offline. There are vision-inspection systems. There are video-inspection systems. There…
Previous columns have addressed some of the topics that provide a foundation for understanding the scope and complexity of the worldwide movement to achieve hazardous-substance free (HSF) products and production processes. This month, let’s take a look at how people have been behaving and why they’…
Auditing clause 7.3 of the design and development section of ISO 9001 can be a challenge for the auditor and the auditee. Unlike purchasing, manufacturing, shipping or order processing, it’s rarely carried out on a regular or consistent schedule. The level of activity ranges from the…
Last year I had the good fortune of doing some consulting with B&C Specialty Products in Hopeulikit, Georgia. B&C does light manufacturing, primarily plastic molding and assembly, and they also distribute imported products produced by companies in the Far East. They have about…
A few years ago, lean thinking came to light. It sounded similar to what I had learned about the “pull” system. I wondered why we renamed cycle time reduction, or just in time (JIT), “lean.” Cycle time reduction was easy to understand and related to responsiveness to customer demands and waste…
Since “Sick Sigma” was published in April 2006, the public has become much more aware of Six Sigma’s failings. There is little risk today of being burnt at the stake for pointing out Six Sigma’s many faults. Last fall, even Dilbert discredited Six Sigma, pointing out that Six Sigma…
Have you noticed that the airwaves no longer carry informative, unadulterated news anymore? “Breaking News” has become the standard, thus all news is presented in an excited, almost breathless, tone. We at home now question the urgency of any segment, particularly when we discover that a cat…
The hiring practices of manufacturing companies have become increasingly lean. The old processes of advertising, screening, interviewing, hiring and training are riddled with waste; it’s both too expensive and extremely time-consuming. The hiring shift to staffing companies has become increasingly…
The hiring practices of manufacturing companies have become increasingly lean. The old processes of advertising, screening, interviewing, hiring and training are riddled with waste; it’s both too expensive and extremely time-consuming. The hiring shift to staffing companies has become increasingly…