In the last blog posting, I covered the importance of developing a Product Specification and getting all the “stakeholders” to agree on what a succ...

The presidents of two manufacturing companies were having a drink in the lobby before the start of their trade association's annual meeting...

Over the past few months I've talked with several different gear manufacturers who are in the process of upgrading their gear making equipment with modern CNC machine tools. Each of these manufacturers has come to the realization that in order to stay competitive, he needs to streamline operations and become more efficient...

[starbox] If ever a situation cried out for a short, texting-friendly acronym it is the unavoidable problem of “You don’t know what you don’t kn...

The final installment of our Job Shop Lean series includes a wide variety of educational resources to help you continue your own lean journey.

Readers respond to our "Job Shop Lean" column and the "My Gear is Bigger than Your Gear" article.

Job shops may be ill-advised to undertake a complete reorganization into FLEAN (Flexible and Lean) cells. A FLEAN cell would (i) be flex-ible enough to produce any and all orders for parts that belong in a specific part family and (ii) utilize lean to the maximum extent possible to eliminate waste.

Although a cell is dedicated to produce a single part family, it must have the requisite equipment capabilities, routing flexibility, cross-trained employees and, to the extent possible, minimal external process dependencies. Cells are often implemented in job shops since they provide the operational benefits of flowline production.

The Tiger Team from Hoerbiger looks for ways to cut waste and improve throughput in the company's assembly cell.

This is the first article in an eight-part "reality" series on implementing continuous improvement at Hoerbiger Corporation. Throughout 2013, Dr. Shahrukh Irani will report on his progress applying the job shop lean strategies he developed during his time at Ohio State University.