This chapter will give you an overview of the features contained in Oracle Flow Manufacturing.
This chapter covers the following topics:
Flow Manufacturing is a manufacturing approach employing the following practices:
Building to customer demand rather than building to a forecast
Reduces finished goods inventories, reduces cost, and increases customer satisfaction.
Linear manufacturing rather than batch production
Reduces work in process inventory, rework, and scrap and increases product quality as quality and assembly problems are immediately addressed.
Mixed model production rather than process layout
Enables a mix of products to be produced on one production line in the same day, which allows the manufacturer to respond to the demand generated by customer orders.
In-process quality rather than inspecting quality into the product after assembly
Builds quality into the product during the production process resulting in less rework, less scrap, lower cost, and higher customer satisfaction.
JIT Replenishment of component materials rather than receipts of MRP forecasted demands.
Reduces the amount of component inventory and reduces costs.
Uses rate-based production rather than work orders
Simplifies shop floor activities and reduces cost.
Labor flexibility rather than labor specialization
Increases productivity and reduces costs.
Backflush material and costs upon completion rather than at each operation
Simplifies shop floor activities and reduces costs.
Oracle Flow Manufacturing includes a comprehensive set of features that support the entire flow process from line design and balancing to production execution. It enables implementation of the demand pull system using kanbans for both raw material and in-process assemblies. The planning process is streamlined using Flow schedules to sequence and schedule mixed model production.
The features provided by Oracle Flow Manufacturing are classified into the following categories:
Demand management is a factor during both the initial design of flow production lines and the daily execution of the rate-based schedules. During the design phase, the objectives of demand management are to group similar products into families, which allows for planning at an aggregate level and to develop a peak daily volume for all products that will be used for line balancing and kanban planning. During production execution, the objectives are to increase responsiveness to customer demand and to maximize resource use.
Oracle Flow Manufacturing uses the demand management tools provided in Oracle MPS/MRP, Supply Chain Planning and Advanced Planning and Scheduling to plan production volumes.
Line design is based upon the anticipated demand for a product or product family. This anticipated demand represents the peak daily volume. All production resources, machines, and labor are then calculated based on these volumes. Additionally, these demand figures and factory schedule hours are used to derive the takt time, or rate that products must be produced to meet the schedule. This figure represents the rate that products must leave the end of the line in order to meet customer demand. See: Product Synchronization.
Oracle Flow Manufacturing uses a kanban pull replenishment system to signal material requirements and pull material from its defined source as needed to meet daily customer demand. The objective of the kanban replenishment system is to continuously improve the production with zero stock outs, shorter lead times, reduced inventory, and minimal supervision. The statement of demand used to balance flow lines to peak daily demand is generally used to size kanbans of components. The use of an MPS or MRP for kanban items gives visibility to the long term plan. This plan is then communicated to trading partners, including marketing and suppliers.
In Oracle Flow Manufacturing, any number of baseline and simulation kanban plans can be created in which kanban quantities for each item or kanban location can be calculated and stored. Optimal kanban quantities can be calculated for the desired demand schedule.
In a flow manufacturing environment, daily production rates tend to be based on customer demand, including marketing orders. Flow lines are balanced with machines and resources to produce at the takt needed to meet the peak daily volume. By design, the daily customer demand should be less than that peak, ensuring that customer demand will be met. However, the mixed and demand represented in daily customer orders are not necessarily in the same ratios as the peak daily volumes are designed for. To manage the demand fluctuations, Oracle Flow Manufacturing uses simple flow schedules to schedule and sequence sales orders.
Line design and balancing is the foundation of a flow production line. The objective is to balance lines for mixed model production at the expected peak demand that take the least possible time to execute. This is accomplished through flat product structures and simple processes which can be communicated visually to meet customer demand daily. Line design includes grouping products into product families, defining the processes and events required to produce each product, and re-grouping events into line operations to approximate takt time.
Effective flow line design and balanced production smooths production and eliminates bottlenecks. Flow lines are designed to reduce production time and resource costs by identifying value added events and eliminating non-value events. Simplified processes are designed to reduce overhead costs by optimizing floor space utilization. This simplified design also helps increase communication on the production floor through visual management tools. Quality is improved by implementing quality into the process, instead of inspecting at the end.
Product synchronization defines the processes used to make each product and the sequence of events within each process. Events are granular tasks within the process that define the physical activities on the line. Each event is assigned the machine and labor times used to perform the event.
Product synchronization tasks are performed in Oracle Flow Manufacturing using flow routings. Flow routings support both processes and sequence of events. In addition flow routings can be used to define the network of processes including feeder lines, rework loops, and both primary and alternate processes required to produce an item. This will help model the line as is to the system. Flow routings and the routing network are also used to calculate the total product cycle time. Total product cycle time is the longest time path on the production line, including feeder lines, required to make the product. See:
Creating a Routing, Oracle Bills of Material User's Guide
The Mixed Model Map Workbench is used to achieve balanced flow lines. The Mixed Model Map Workbench combines the information from the products assigned to a specific line—including their routing, product family grouping, and forecasted demand. This information is displayed in a graphical interface. The takt time is calculated from the daily production requirements (demand) and the available production hours in a day. The summary portion of the Mixed Model Map displays the machine and labor resources needed to meet the takt time. Since takt time establishes the rhythm of the line, all the processes along the line are streamlined to complete within the takt time. This ensures that each product moves from process to process within the takt time, which maintains the steady production rate necessary to meet the demand. See: Overview of Mixed Model Map Workbench
While engineering provides information on product routings in the form of processes and sequence of events, manufacturing faces the challenge of organizing work on a production line so that bottlenecks are minimized and work cells are balanced. As a result, manufacturing evaluates the feasibility of reorganizing the events into groups that approximate takt time. Managing the imbalances leads to analysis for the following:
Reducing or eliminating non-value added work
Using smaller units for the work, or grouping into larger units
Increasing resource (machine, labor) capacity
Increasing in-process inventory
Adding additional lines
Once the current line has been set up with items, organizations, the flow line, a forecast, and the product routings defined, the line can be balanced through iterative processes using the Graphical Line Designer Workbench. See: Accessing Graphical Line Designer Workbench Windows
Operation Method Sheets (OMS) provide the needed information to shop floor personnel for performing an operation on the line. This information can include pictures of the assembly process, required materials, and written work instructions. These are the primary tools used to perform the operations and are especially critical on lines making many models.
Oracle Flow Manufacturing supports Operation Method Sheets using the Attachments feature. Multimedia documents can be attached to, and maintained for, each line operation on the flow routing of each item.
In flow manufacturing, line scheduling is equal to line design and balancing in terms of importance. A line well designed to meet average daily demand that is scheduled improperly can cause excessive changeover, large peaks in demand to kanbans, or unbalanced demand on resources. Each of these will undermine the line's ability to perform to takt. Oracle Flow Manufacturing allows for the creation and use of simple scheduling rules to schedule either sales or planned orders for the flow line. The objective of line scheduling is to sequence production to maximize resource utilization and minimize delays.
Line scheduling allows for:
Creation of a scheduling rule based on predefined sequencing criteria and scheduling algorithms
Viewing of all unscheduled orders for your line and choose which orders you want to schedule
Scheduling the line and viewing the final flow schedule.
Scheduling rules determine the logic used to create flow schedules from orders. They are a combination of sequencing criteria and scheduling algorithms that can help you pull demand forward or backward in time, in order to meet takt for each day.
Scheduling algorithms are used to smooth demand by restricting the number of each assembly that is scheduled in any given day. Demand smoothing is important because the line is designed based on an average daily mix. However, seldom will a line produce exactly the mix for which it was designed. Demand smoothing ensures that the mix is maintained as closely as possible, which helps the line to operate more efficiently and achieve takt time on a daily basis.
Note: Line Scheduling does not schedule a portion of a product: the algorithm rounds decimal quantities up to whole units before scheduling.
Sequencing criteria are used to determine the priority in which sales orders are scheduled.
Sequencing is the process of determining the order in which assembly items are built on a production line. Attributes, constraints, rules are used in your production lines to create sequencing tasks. The sequence in which assembly items are built determines the efficiency of the line, and therefore, the productivity of the manufacturing organization. The Sequencing pages enable you to set up task components, generate tasks, and view the results. The Flow Sequencing concurrent program takes the sequencing task as input, and creates Flow schedules to meet production demands.
Related Topics
Overview of the Line Scheduling Workbench, Oracle Master Scheduling/MRP and Oracle Supply Chain Planning.
Line Scheduling Workbench Options Window, Oracle Master Scheduling/MRP and Oracle Supply Chain Planning.
How Scheduling is Calculated, Oracle Master Scheduling/MRP and Oracle Supply Chain Planning.
As throughput time and inventory levels are driven down during implementation of Oracle Flow Manufacturing, the need for and value of detailed production information becomes less critical. This creates the opportunity to eliminate or streamline production execution transactions. One of the tools provided by Oracle Flow Manufacturing to help in this process is the Work Order-less Completion transaction.
The Mixed Model Map Workbench is the tool that Oracle Flow Manufacturing uses to achieve balanced flow lines. After lines have been designed and during the production cycle, the Mixed Model Map becomes a tool to evaluate the impact of the current production schedule on the resources, operational times and in-process kanbans. In this mode, the summary portion of the Mixed Model Map displays the machine and labor resources needed to meet the takt time for the current production load. The baseline comparison highlights where labor resources can be removed to allow for flexing and where extra resources or overtime may be needed to produce the demand. See: Overview of Mixed Model Map Workbench
Production is recorded with the Work Order-less Completion transaction against flow schedules created with the Line Scheduling Workbench. Completions can be either unscheduled or scheduled against a flow schedule. The system backflushes all components and performs resource and overhead transactions upon recording completion of the finished product. Additionally, Oracle Flow Manufacturing allows assembly completions to be recorded without having to create work orders, a job or repetitive schedule, or a flow schedule.
Work order-less completions do the following:
Backflush pull and push components
Charge resources and overhead based on the flow routing
See: Work Order-less Completions, Oracle Work in Process
The costing method of the organization determines whether mixed manufacturing methods can be used. Costing in a flow environment is usually done using standard costing methods. Average costing may also be used, particularly when used in conjunction with project manufacturing. Cost variances are collected and posted during the Work Order-less Completion transaction.
You can perform component picking transactions for flow schedules using the rules based system in Oracle Warehouse Management. Flow manufacturing environments use kanban signals to control the replenishment of components on the line. However, the picking functionality can be used for slower moving or randomly used planned components to create move orders for supply type Push components. The requirements in component picking for flow schedules include:
The material picked is based on Oracle Inventory allocation rules entered on the Picking Rules window, or Oracle Warehouse Management rules based picking recommendations.
Material must be defined at a valid line operation, and the line is open.
The supply type of the component is Push.
Move orders are generated only when the flow schedule components can be filled. If the components are not on hand, backorders are not created.
There are two methods for accessing the Component Pick Release program in a Flow environment. You can use the Component Pick Release window to select requirements, or you can specify a Pick Release Operation in the Flow Execution Workstation preferences.
The Component Pick Release window is used to select requirements and create move orders. This window is a graphical workbench that displays fields applicable to the job or schedule type accessed.
You can specify an operation in the Flow Execution Workstation parameters to call the Component Pick Release program. In the Pick Release Operation parameter field, specify a standard operation code. When you enter a value in this field, the Component Pick Release program creates move orders at that point in the flow line. When the Line Operation completion transaction occurs, the Picking API is called for the schedule. This functionality does the same action as entering a schedule in the Schedule Number field of the Component Pick Release window.
Overview of Component Picking, Oracle Work in Processs
Using the Component Pick Release Window, Oracle Work in Progress User's Guide
The Flow Execution Workstation provides features for tracking the flow of work, completing assemblies, and viewing detail information. You can view Flow schedules, line operations and their corresponding event sequences, components, resources, and instructions. The workstation enables you to complete schedules and line operations, record lot and serial information, enter quality plan data, customize your display of information, and check for eligible engineering change orders (ECOs). See: Initializing the Flow Execution Workstation
A key objective of flow manufacturing and JIT production is to minimize inventory and increase inventory turns. Raw material is pulled into production as needed to meet demand and the pulled material is replenished using a kanban signal. The minimum amount of material possible, based on replenishment time is held at the line in kanban bins. As each bin is emptied, a signal is issued to replenish the bin and the next bin is used to pull the material.
There are many kanban systems in use today but the most commonly used are the two-bin (two card) system and the multibin (multicard) system. Oracle Flow Manufacturing supports both these systems for planning and execution during production.
Oracle Flow Manufacturing calculates the optimal number of kanbans needed in each kanban location. It can calculate the number of kanbans needed when a bin quantity is specified or it can calculate the kanban size if the number of bins are specified. Oracle Flow Manufacturing allows the simulation of multiple kanban plans. Kanbans currently in use can be compared and adjusted against kanban requirements for consistently varying demands. This process helps in both maintaining minimal material inventory and continuity of material flow from the supplier to the production line.
Oracle Flow Manufacturing helps you define the kanban locations for each item along with the supply source information. The supply source can be suppliers, other production lines, other inventory organizations in the enterprise, or other kanban locations in the same organization. A complete chain of demand-supply pull sequences can be defined for kanban planning.
Non-replenishable kanbans are used to meet unexpected peaks in demand. For demand variations that are infrequent and unplanned, Oracle Flow Manufacturing allows non-replenishable kanban cards. These cards are created for specific items in specific quantities as needed. Non-replenishable kanbans cycle through the system only once, after which they are removed from production.
Oracle Flow Manufacturing generates appropriate events for each kanban signal. For kanbans that are sourced through suppliers, the system can generate requisitions and purchase orders. Sourcing rules can also be used to create blanket releases against purchase contracts. Internal requisitions can be generated for interorganization replenishments.
Oracle Flow Manufacturing supports different statuses of kanban cards to help track their release cycle. Supported statuses include Full, Empty, In-Process, In-Transit, Hold, and others. Kanban Cards can also be accumulated and released together when a minimum order quantity greater than the kanban size is specified. A number of modifiers such as safety stock days and lot multiplier allow you to create a smooth signaling and replenishment system.
Modifying and Creating Pull Sequences on the Graphical Network