Lean Manufacturing Solutions

Four problems that account for most projects

We are rarely asked for "a workbench". We are asked to fix something: the line cannot be changed fast enough, material arrives at the station in the wrong place, stock does not rotate, or the cell looks chaotic and nobody can see what is missing. Each of those has a structural answer.

Assembly lines that cannot flex

When changeover time is the constraint, the frame is the problem. Bolted pipe and joint structures can be extended, shortened or reconfigured by one person with hand tools, without a fabrication drawing and without a shutdown. The design principle is to build the frame so that the next change touches as few parts as possible — keep stations modular and standardise the pitch between them.

Material arriving at the wrong place

Line-side supply works when material is presented at the point of use, at the right height, in the right quantity, facing the right way. In practice this means a flow rack or gravity lane at the station rather than a pallet on the floor, sized to the replenishment interval rather than to the delivery truck. Get the lane depth wrong and you either restock hourly or you build a storage rack that defeats rotation.

Stock that does not rotate

First-in-first-out only works when it is enforced by geometry. A gravity flow rack loads at the back and picks at the front, so the newest item physically cannot be picked first. Anything that relies on discipline instead of geometry will be done correctly until the first busy shift, and then not again.

Cells that look chaotic

5S fails mostly because there is nowhere for the exceptions to go. The fix is structural: shadow boards at the point of use, bins at the height they are used, a defined place for work-in-progress, and a visible place for the reject. A cell with a home for everything stays ordered; one without it returns to disorder within a month of every audit.

How a project runs

Send the application, a photograph or sketch, the load and how it is applied, and the space available. We propose a frame and a parts list, flag where the design is close to its limit, and quote. For repeat orders the drawing is kept, which is the practical advantage of a standard frame system: the second station costs less than the first because the thinking is already done.