Operations Focus – Time Management on Lines

“One of the most noteworthy accomplishments in keeping the price of products low is the gradual shortening of the production cycle. The longer an article is in the process of manufacture and the more it is moved about, the greater is its ultimate cost.” – Henry Ford

The large portion of assets used by a firm (capital, people, and time) are in the operations side of the business. This is true for both large and small organizations. Coordination, deployment, and management of these resources are key in strengthening the backbone of the organization and the country.

Organizations tend to look at their manufacturing operations only during times of crisis. COVID and vaccine manufacturing being the most recent examples. When operations occur smoothly, they are almost invisible. However, manufacturing operations are finally getting the attention of business leaders, who were once occupied with marketing or finance.

This article focuses on time management at your facility. Time can be classified into processing and non-processing time. The amount of time used in producing the product is called the processing time. Activities such as changeovers fall into the non-processing time. Companies' focus on processing time events is proportionally higher than ways to reduce the non-processing time on the lines.

In this article, we will talk about one non-processing time improvement suggestion followed by using OEE to measure the processing time on manufacturing lines. Finally, we will wrap up the article with understanding the role of humans in the age of automation and IIOT.

The King of Non-Processing Downtime — Changeovers

Changeovers are the biggest contributors to non-processing time. Period. They consume available time within an operational environment. Personnel with specialized skill sets are charged with diverse activities such as clearance, changing parts, adjustments, calibrations, etc. These sequences in specialized activities require planning and potential delays.

The dependence and siloed nature of such activities can restrict the adoption of innovative equipment on site. Companies should explore ways to simplify and error-proof changeovers. Such mistakes can lead to expensive rework in products and unplanned downtime.

Fortunately, the interconnectivity of devices using open standard protocols and software management tools has enabled changeover automation. We at Markem-Imaje believe in systems thinking for operations. We are one component of a bigger machine or process. Therefore, we have devised innovative ways to communicate with line-level devices utilizing the existing infrastructure to reduce changeover time on your lines.

One example can be pushing required settings to the line-level equipment based on the process order assigned by the ERP platform. With the scan of a 2D barcode, the line supervisor initiates the printers and inspection systems for production. This simple example can reduce the non-processing time from 60 min to 15 min. Considering 30 changeovers a month, this results in a monthly saving of 22 hours. 22 hours of additional production time is a huge boost to manufacturing facilities.

Our Systech Brand Protection Suite? software can seamlessly integrate line-level equipment such as printers and cameras to a centralized system to automate changeovers. Using OPC servers, Markem-Imaje can easily deploy or integrate into your network of devices and control systems equipment. With collaboration with various ERP platforms, we can now support data flow from L5 to L0.

The Auditor of Unplanned Downtime – OEE

Overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) and lean manufacturing have won many converts. These two disciplines are frequently linked because they provide a systematic way to design manufacturing processes, measure their efficiency and identify problems. OEE is a hierarchy of metrics used to evaluate how effectively a manufacturing operation is utilized. It is a methodology employed to drive equipment performance improvement and detail efficiency losses and is generally applied to the bottleneck of the system.

OEE calculations have three components: Availability (Uptime); Performance (Speed); Quality.

Without delving into the theory of OEE calculation, the goal of several manufacturing organizations today is to increase their OEE numbers. Here are some ideas to increase the site’s OEE.

Over time, OEE has resulted in the complex architecture of data collection. More levels mean more devices, physical connections, configurations, programming, bottlenecks, and single points of failure. Yet traditional architectures have needed all these things to bring even one data point up to the cloud. Lots of layers in a birthday cake are usually considered a good thing, but it is exactly the opposite situation for industrial communication architectures.

A simple alarm contact or field sensor is most often wired into a PLC, which is programmed to accept the signal and perhaps scale it. More code is needed to get this signal into the HMI or SCADA system, with yet more code and networking required to transfer the signal to the cloud.

Once commissioned, these connections can be unreliable and difficult to troubleshoot. Additionally, the poll-and-response communications, manual data mapping, and lack of embedded data context make these connections cumbersome to configure and expand. Legacy products and older protocols offer little or no security and can become progressively more unwieldy as time progresses. Software updates to one link in the chain, for example, a PC-based HMI or SCADA system, can negatively affect communications. (InTech_ISA, 2020)

When it comes to OEE, every point of potential failure can lead to incorrect data being provided to the decision-makers. Simplifying data flow to the OEE “calculator” can prevent delays in OEE numbers.

The answer lies in improvement in edge computing. In the edge computing model, however, the data demands of large networks are served by embedding more computing power in the field, where data is produced. Rather than requiring a deep technology stack to move data from limited field devices to powerful central computing resources, edge computing devices are capable of processing data directly at the source and then transmitting it wherever it needs to go.

Markem-Imaje is structuring our devices to be at the very forefront of improved edge capability by processing data on line-level equipment. Some of the features of the Markem-Imaje OEE platform:

Collects production data directly from existing printers ? Optional OPC-based (open platform communication) production counters ? Calculates overall OEE from availability, performance, and quality KPIs ? Configurable line constraints and downtime reasons ? Operator interface for rapid selection of downtime reasons ? Configurator for automated planned stops with downtime reasons ? Live factory and line dashboards for immediate operator intervention ? Historical reporting for analyzing inefficiency trends and root causes ? Advanced configuration of screens and workflows for site-specific processes ? Advanced line integration for automatic downtime reason collection.

The Human Touch

Finally, despite automation, the key to any manufacturing facility is the people. In the age of digitization, a simple tool can boost efficiency in operations significantly. Gone are the days of large binders in the maintenance room, in fact now, there are more open lines of communication between the vendor and the operator. Empowering the line personnel boosts your efficiency and results in knowledge retention.

We at Markem-Imaje have worked on two tools to do just that. Firstly, we have MIVA (Markem-Imaje Virtual Assistant). Leveraging the latest in artificial intelligence, operators can use this platform to self-troubleshoot the equipment. Furthermore, lengthy phone calls with customer support are cut short because MIVA feeds data directly to our customer support team. Ticket generation is automated, and this tool is accessible on the Markem-Imaje website.  

Highlights of MIVA:

Key features:

• Easy to access, intuitive, and interactive user manuals
• Multiple “do it yourself” videos
• 24/7 availability of advanced, machine-learning troubleshooting including direct escalation to the Markem-Imaje Helpdesk
• Supporting all key Markem-Imaje technologies
• Multiple language support (Chinese, German, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Japanese, English)

Secondly, we are actively trying to bring the vendor (Markem-Imaje) closer to the site operations. Traditionally, the facility is accustomed to vendors visiting the facility to troubleshoot issues. However, in the age of Covid and cutthroat efficiency demands, the delay in response is just not acceptable. Markem-Imaje has worked on a remote video support tool to enable operators and line personnel to interface with our team. 

Some of the highlights of Remote Video Support:

• Real-time, fast connection
• Intuitive user interface
• Augmented reality and support tools for guidance
• Sharing of videos, pictures, and documents

Our Remote Video Support enables you, wherever you’re located in the world, to quickly recover from unexpected technical and mechanical issues without the need for a field service engineer on site. Thanks to our new tool we can easily support you remotely with live video guidance—drastically reducing downtime, decreasing waste, and saving costs.

In conclusion, manufacturers and industrial organizations are starting to invest in Industrial Internet of Things (IIOT) programs to help accelerate the era of IT-optimized smart manufacturing. While there is no one fix to all the issues on your production lines, let us help you in improving your processes in small but determined steps. 

Shouvick Basak; Strategic Account Manager in Markem-Imaje North America. I work with clients to accelerate their digital transformation using intelligent insights. The Strategic Account Team leads the overall implementation for the Markem-Imaje product portfolio with its largest global accounts for improvements in packaging and supply chain efficiencies. I joined Markem-Imaje in 2019 and have extensive experience in track and trace serialization solutions in the pharmaceutical industry; execution of system integration, upgrade, and migration projects; and leadership of technical strategy and solution development, business incubation.