What Is One Piece Flow

The key to one piece flow is to connect and synchronize each individual activity process to eliminate the eightcategories of waste. This requires improved layouts to minimize travel distance between successive operations.

Manufacturing departments in atraditional plant environment perform a specific task (i.e., grinding, welding, fabrication, drilling, assembly) utilizing workers who have developed a single skill.

Manufacturing cells , however, are designed to provide complete products to an internal work cell or an external customer.

Work cells perform several operations or tasks and require multi-skilled, flexible workers.

The most common obstacle to implementing one piece flow production is that old beliefs and habits need to be discarded and replaced by new ones.

For years, producing parts in large batches has been the rule. Major inhibitors to flow in a production environment or business process include process variability, product defects, material shortages, and equipment failure.

In a one piece flow environment, each part is pulled through one piece at a time. This greatly reduces the manufacturing lead time. The ultimate goal is to have each activity task producing in a one-piece flow methodology.

Thus, u-shaped work cells are created and linked to complete all process activities in the minimal amount of physical space. Principles of good work cell layout include arranging the work sequentially, using a counter clockwise flow, locating machines and processes close together,and locating the last operation close to the first operation.

The work cell is designed to accomplish line balance withrespect to takt time, and authorization for production is triggered by kanban.

Work cell employees are responsible for the daily production of products to meet internal and external customer needs. The typical work cell employee is empowered to take all actions necessary to meet customer needs, as long as that action is not in conflict with the work cell principles.

By applying one-piece flow you will :

• Reduces throughput time and increases velocity for customer orders from order receipt through production and shipment.
• Improves value-added ratio through elimination of non-value-added activities which reduces operating costs.
• Allows the company higher degrees of flexibility to accommodate changes in customer demand.
• Saves space in the factory.
• Promotes continuous improvement as problems are exposed.
• Reduces transportation, waiting, overproduction, processing, inventory, and motion waste that occurs with batch processing.
• Lowers the risks of product damage, deterioration, and obsolescence.
• Simplifies scheduling.
• Supports high-variety production.
• Reduces cycle time through increased production velocity.
• Supports quality production.
• Enhances the employee's productive capability through multi-skilled multi-machine operators.