UNIT – 2

Process planning
In companies, planning processes can result in increased output, higher
precision, and faster turnaround for vital business tasks. A process is described
as a set of steps that result in a specific outcome. It converts input into output.
Process planning is also called manufacturing planning, material processing,
process engineering, and machine routing. It is the act of preparing detailed
work instructions to produce a part. It is a complete description of specific
stages in the production process. Process planning determines how the
product will be produced or service will be provided. Process planning converts
design information into the process steps and instructions to powerfully and
effectively manufacture products. As the design is supported by many
computer-aided tools, computer-aided process planning (CAPP) has evolved to
make simpler and improve process planning and realize more effectual use of
manufacturing resources.

Process Planning
It has been documented that process planning is required for new product and
services. It is the base for designing factory buildings, facility layout and
selecting production equipment. It also affects the job design and quality
control.
Objective of Process Planning: The chief of process planning is to augment and
modernize the business methods of a company. Process planning is planned to
renovate design specification into manufacturing instructions and to make
products within the function and quality specification at the least possible
costs. This will result in reduced costs, due to fewer staff required to complete
the same process, higher competence, by eradicating process steps such as
loops and bottlenecks, greater precision, by including checkpoints and success
measures to make sure process steps are completed precisely, better
understanding by all employees to fulfil their department objectives. Process
planning deals with the selection of the and the determination of conditions of
the processes. The particular operations and conditions have to be realised in
order to change raw material into a specified shape. All the specifications and
conditions of operations are included in the process plan. The plan is a
certificate such as engineering drawing. Both the engineering drawing and the
process plan present the fundamental for the manufacturing of products.
Process planning influences time to market and productions cost.
Consequently, the planning activities have immense importance for
competitive advantage.

Principles of Process Planning

General principles for evaluating or enhancing processes are as follows:
1. First define the outputs, and then look toward the inputs needed to achieve
those outputs.
2. Describe the goals of the process, and assess them frequently to make sure
they are still appropriate. This would include specific measures like quality
scores and turnaround times.
3. When mapped, the process should appear as a logical flow, without loops
back to earlier steps or departments.
4. Any step executed needs to be included in the documentation. If not, it
should be eliminated or documented, depending on whether or not it's
necessary to the process.
5. People involved in the process should be consulted, as they often have the
most current information.
Process planning includes the activities and functions to develop a
comprehensive plans and instructions to produce a part. The planning starts
with engineering drawings, specifications, parts or material lists and a forecast
of demand. The results of the planning are routings which specify operations,
operation sequences, work centres, standards, tooling and fixtures. This
routing becomes a major input to the manufacturing resource planning system
to define operations for production activity control purposes and define
required resources for capacity requirements planning purposes.

Process plans which characteristically offer more detailed, step-by-step work

instructions including dimensions linked to individual operations, machining
parameters, set-up instructions, and quality assurance checkpoints. Process
plans results in fabrication and assembly drawings to support manufacture and
annual planning is based on a manufacturing engineer's experience and
knowledge of production facilities, equipment, their capabilities, processes,
and tooling. But planning is very lengthy and the results differ based on the
person doing the planning.

Major steps in process planning: Process planning has numerous steps to

complete the project that include the definition, documentation, review and
improvement of steps in business processes used in a company.
The first step is to describe what the process should accomplish. It includes
queries like, what is the output of this process? Who receives the output, and
how do they define success? What are the inputs for the process? Are there
defined success measures in place — such as turnaround time or quality
scores? And Are there specific checkpoints in the process that need to be
addressed?
Documentation: During the documentation stage, interviews are conducted
with company personnel to determine the steps and actions they take as part
of a specific business process. The results of these interviews are written
down, generally in the form of a flow chart, with copies of any forms used or
attached. These flow charts are given to the involved departments to review,
to make sure information has been correctly captured in the chart.
Review: Next, the flow charts are reviewed for potential problem areas.
Process planning in manufacturing may include the following activities:
1. Selection of raw-stock,
2. Determination of machining methods,
3. Selection of machine tools,
4. Selection of cutting tools,
5. Selection or design of fixtures and jigs,
6. Determination of set-up,
7. Determination of machining sequences,
8. Calculations or determination of cutting conditions,
9. Calculation and planning of tool paths,
 Processing the process plan

3 Main Types of Process Planning:

1. Manual Process Planning: This type of planning is known as man-

variant process planning and is the commonest type of planning used
for production today.
Planning the operations to be used to produce a part requires knowledge of
two groups of variables:
(i) The part requirements (as indicated by an engineering drawing) and,
(ii) The available machines and processes, and the capabilities of each process.
Given these variables, the planner selects the combination of required to
produce a finished part. In selecting this combination of a number of criteria
are employed. Production cost or time are usually the dominant criteria in
process selection; however, machine utilization and routing often affect the
plans chosen.
In general, the planner tries to select the best set of processes and machines to
produce a whole family of parts rather than just a single part.

2. Automated Process Planning:

Man-variant planning (at times) becomes a boring and tedious job. It produces
erroneous process plans. This, coupled with the labour intensity of man-variant
planning, has led many industries to investigate the automation of process
planning.
A completely automated process planning system would eliminate all human
effort between the preparation of an engineering drawing and a complete
process plan for every manufacturing operation.
The block labelled LOGIC would include the capability to scan and interpret the
drawing, to convert this information into process requirements and to select
machines, tools and operations to yield an economically acceptable product.
Such a system would be truly automated. Self-contained logic would check for
contradictory requirements on the Engineering drawing.
These requirements would be checked for compatibility with available
processes. Selection of the processes (such as turning, milling or stamping)
would be based on product requirements, quantities ordered and process
capabilities. Whenever contradictory or incompatible requirements were
detected, a printed message would indicate the source of the problem and
recommend remedial action.
Many developments in computer-aided process planning have focused on
eliminating the process planner from the entire planning function. Computer-
aided planning can reduce some of the decision making required during a
planning process.
Advantages of computer-aided process planning:
(a) It can reduce the process planning time.
(b) It can reduce the skill required of a planner.
(c) It can create more consistent plans.
(d) It can produce more accurate plans.
(e) It can increase productivity.
(f) It can reduce both process planning and manufacturing costs.
Benefits from computer-aided process planning have been documented by
several industries. Such systems can reduce planning time from days to hours
or from hours to minutes.

3. Generative Process Planning:

Generative planning may be defined as a system that synthesizes process
information in order to create a process plan for a new component
automatically. Process plans are created from information available in a
manufacturing database with little or no human intervention.
Upon receiving the design model, the system can generate the required
operations sequence for the component. Knowledge of manufacturing must be
captured and encoded into efficient software. By applying decision logic, a
process planner's decision-making can be imitated. Other planning functions,
such as machine selection, tool selection, optimization, and so on, can also be
automated using generative planning techniques.
Decisions on process selection, sequencing, and so on, are all made by the
system. However, transforming component data and decision rules into a
computer-readable format is still a major obstacle to be overcome before
generative planning systems become operational.
Generative method of process planning:
The generative method of process planning essentially consists of four steps:
(1) Describe a part in detail.
(2) Describe a catalogue of processes available to produce parts.
(3) Describe the machine tool(s) that can perform these processes.
(4) Create the software to inspect the part, process, and available machinery to
determine whether all three are compatible.
Advantages
(a) It can generate consistent process plans rapidly.
(b) New components can be planned as easily as existing components.
(c) It can potentially be interfaced with an automated manufacturing facility
to provide detailed and up-to-date control information.

Computer Aided Process Planning:

Manufacturers have been following an evolutionary step to improve and
computerize process planning in the following 5 stages :

Stage 1: Manual classification; standardized process plans

Stage 2: Computer maintained process plan
Stage 3: Variant CAPP
Stage 4: Generative CAPP
Stage 5: Dynamic, Generative CAPP

Earlier to CAPP, producers attempted to triumph over the issues of manual

process planning by basic categorization of parts into families and developing
standardized process plans for parts families that is called Stage l.
When a new part is initiated, the process plan for that family would be
manually recovered, marked-up and retyped. While this improved output but
it did not enhance the quality of the planning of processes.
Computer-aided process planning originally developed as a device to
electronically store a process plan once it was shaped, recover it, amend it for
a new part and print the plan. It is called
Stage 2. Other ability of this stage is table-driven cost and standard estimating
systems.
Stage 3: Computer-aided approach of variant CAPP is based on a Group
Technology coding and classification approach to recognize huge number of
part attributes or parameters. These attributes permit the system to choose a
baseline process plan for the part family and achieve about ninety percent of
the planning work. The schemer will add the remaining ten percent of the
effort modifying or fine-tuning the plan. The baseline process plans stored in
the computer are manually entered using a super planner concept that is,
developing standardized plans based on the accumulated experience and
knowledge of multiple planners and manufacturing engineers.
Stage 4: It is generative CAPP. In this stage, process planning decision rules are
developed into the system. These decision rules will work based on a part's
group technology or features technology coding to produce a process plan that
will require minimal manual interaction and modification.
While CAPP systems move towards being generative, a pure generative system
that can create a complete process plan from part classification and other
design data is a goal of the future. These types of generative system will utilize
artificial intelligence type capabilities to produce process plans as well as be
fully integrated in a CIM environment. An additional step in this stage is
dynamic, generative CAPP which would consider plant and machine capacities,
tooling availability, work center and equipment loads, and equipment status in
developing process plans.
The process plan developed with a CAPP system at Stage V would differ in due
course depending on the resources and workload in the factory. Dynamic,
generative CAPP also entails the need for online display of the plan on a work
order-oriented basis to cover that the appropriate plan was provided to the
floor.
There are numerous advantages of this type of process planning. It can
decrease the skill required of a planner. It can reduce the process planning
time. It can reduce both process planning and manufacturing cost. It can create
more consistent plans. It can produce more accurate plans. It can increase
productivity. Automated planning is done for shortening the lead-time,
manufacturability feedback, lowering the production cost and consistent
process plans. Advantages of Computer-aided Process Planning include
reduced demand on the skilled planner, reduced process planning time,
reduced process planning and manufacturing cost, created more consistent
plans, produced accurate plans, increased productivity, increased high
flexibility, attained high efficiency, attained adequate high product quality and
possibility of integration with the other automated functions and systems.
Manufacturing Process Planning delivers essential process planning potential
for all manufacturing industries. Using Manufacturing Process Planning,
process planners can powerfully create and authenticate the original process
plan using the product structure from product engineering, modify the plan to
specific requirements, and link products and resources to the steps of the plan.

To summarize, Process Planning is important action in a production enterprise

that verifies which processes, materials, and instructions will be used to
produce a product. Process planning describes a manufacturing facility, and
parameters which are to be used to change materials from a primary form to a
predetermined final stage.

Production planning and Control: Objectives, Advantages,

elements
Production planning and control is an important task of Production Manager. It
has to see that production is properly decided in advance and it is carried out
as per the plan. Production is related to the conversion of raw materials into
finished goods. This conversion process involves a number of steps such as
deciding what to produce, how to produce, when to produce, etc. These
decisions are a part, of production planning. Merely deciding about the task is
not sufficient.
The whole process should be carried out in a best possible way and at the
lowest cost. Production Manager will have to see that the things as per the
plans. This is a control function and has to be carried as meticulously as
planning. Both planning and control of production are necessary to produce
better quality goods at reasonable prices and in a most systematic manner.
Production planning is the function of looking ahead, anticipating difficulties to
be faced and the likely remedial steps to remove them. It may be said to be a
technique of forecasting ahead every step in the long process of production,
taking them at a right time and in the right degree and trying to complete the
operations at maximum efficiency. Production control, on the other hand,
guides and directs flow of production so that products are manufactured in a
best way and conform to a planned schedule and are of the right quality.
Control facilitates the task of manufacturing and see that everything goes as
per the plans.

Charles A. Koepke:
"Production planning and control is the coordination of a series of functions
according to a plan which will economically utilize the plant facilities and
regulate the orderly movement of goods through the entire manufacturing
cycle, from the procurement of all materials to the shipping of finished goods
at a predetermined rate."

James L. Lundy:
"Basically, the production control function involves the co-ordination and
integration of the factors of production for optimum efficiency. Overall sales
orders or plans must be translated into specific schedules and assigned so as to
all work centres but overload none. The job can be done formally in which case
elaborate charting and filing techniques are used ; or it can be done informally,
with individuals' thoughts and retention there of supplanting tangible aids."

Goldon B. Carson:
"Production planning and control involves generally the organization and
planning of the manufacturing process. Specifically, it consists of the planning
of the routing, scheduling, dispatching and inspection, co-ordination and the
control of materials, methods, machines, tooling and operating times. The
ultimate objective is the organization of the supply and movement of materials
and labour, machine utilization and related activities, in order to bring about
the desired manufacturing results in terms of quantity, time and place."
Following are the objectives of production planning and control functions:
1. Systematic planning of production activities to achieve the highest efficiency
in production of goods/services.
2. To organize the production facilities like machines, men, etc., to achieve
stated production objectives with respect to quantity and quality time and
cost.
3. Optimum scheduling of resources.
4. Coordinate with other departments relating to production to achieve regular
balanced and uninterrupted production flow.
5. To conform to delivery commitments.
6. Materials planning and control.
7. To be able to make adjustments due to changes in demand and rush orders.

The importance of production planning and control are summarized below:

• Better Service to Customers: Production planning and control, through
proper scheduling and expediting of work, helps in providing better services to
customers is terms of better quality of goods at reasonable prices as per
promised delivery dates. Delivery in time and proper quality, both help in
winning the confidence of customers, improving relations with customers and
promoting profitable repeat orders.
• Fewer Rush Orders: In an organization, where there is effective system of
production planning and control, production, operations move smoothly as per
original planning and matching with the promised delivery dates.
Consequently, there will be fewer rush orders in the plant and less overtime
than, in the same industry, without adequate production planning and control.
• Better Control of Inventory: A sound system of production planning and
control helps in maintaining inventory at proper levels and, thereby,
minimizing investment in inventory. It requires lower inventory of work-in-
progress and less finished stock to give efficient service to customers. It also
helps in exercising better control over raw-material inventory, which
contributes to more effective purchasing.
• More Effective Use of Equipment: An efficient system of production planning
and control makes for the most effective use of equipment. It provides
information to the management on regular basis pertaining to the present
position of all orders in process, equipment and personnel requirements for
next few weeks. The workers can be communicated well in advance if any
retrenchment, lay-offs, transfer, etc. is likely to come about. Also, unnecessary
purchases of equipment and materials can be avoided. Thus, it is possible to
ensure proper utilization of equipment and other resources.
• Reduced Idle Time: Production planning and control helps in reducing idle
time i.e., loss of time by workers waiting for materials and other facilities;
because ensures that materials and other facilities are available to the workers
in time as per the production schedule. Consequently, less man-hours are lost,
which has a positive impact on the cost of production.
• Improved Plant Morale: An effective system of production planning and
control co-ordinates the activities of all the departments involved in the
production activity. It ensures even flow of work and avoids rush orders. It
maintains healthy working conditions in the plant thus, there is improve plant
morale as a by-product.
• Good public image: A proper system of production planning and control is
helpful in keeping systematized operations in an organization. Such an
organization is in a position to meet its orders in time to the satisfaction of its
customers. Customer's satisfaction leads to increased sales, increased profits,
industrial harmony and ultimately good public image of the enterprise.
• Lower capital requirements: Under a sound system of production planning
and control, everything relating to production is planned well in advance of
operations. Where, when and what is required in the form of input is known
before the actual production process starts. Inputs are made available as per
schedule which ensures even flow of production without any bottlenecks.
Facilities are used more effectively and inventory levels are kept as per
schedule neither more nor less. Thus, production planning and control helps, in
minimizing capital investment in equipment and inventories.

Main elements of production planning & control

The following are main elements of Production Planning and Control.
1. Routing
2. Loading
3. Scheduling
4. Dispatching
5. Follow up
6. Inspection
7. Corrective

1. Routing
It is about selection of path or route through which raw materials pass in
order to make it into a finished product. The points to be noted while routing
process are — full capacity of machines, economical and short route and
availability of alternate routing. Setting up time for the process for each stage
of route is to be fixed. Once overall sequence are fixed, then the standard time
of operations are noted using work measurement technique.
2. Loading and scheduling
Loading and Scheduling are concerned with preparation of workloads and
fixing of starting and completing date of each operation. On the basis of the
performance of each machine, loading and scheduling tasks are completed.
3. Dispatching
Dispatching is the routine of setting productive activities in motion through the
release of orders and instructions, in accordance with previously planned time
and sequence, embodied in route sheet and schedule charts. It is here the
orders are released.
4. Expediting / Follow-up
It is a control tool which brings an idea on breaking up, delay, rectifying error
etc., during the progress of work.
5. Inspection
Inspection is to find out the quality of executed work process.
6. Corrective
At evaluation process, a thorough analysis is done and corrective measures are
taken in the weaker spots.
Aggregate Planning: Meaning, Strategies and Cost
Aggregate planning is the of developing, analysing, and maintaining a
preliminary, approximate schedule of the overall operations of an
organization. The aggregate plan generally contains targeted sales forecasts,
production levels, inventory levels, and customer backlogs. This schedule is
intended to satisfy the demand forecast at a minimum cost. Properly done,
aggregate planning should minimize the effects of shortsighted, day-to-day
scheduling, in which small amounts of material may be ordered one week, with
an accompanying layoff of workers, followed by ordering larger amounts and
rehiring workers the next week. This longer-term perspective on resource use
can help minimize short-term requirements changes with a resulting cost
savings.
In simple terms, aggregate planning is an attempt to balance capacity and
demand in such a way that costs are minimized. The term "aggregate" is used
because planning at this level includes all resources "in the aggregate;" for
example, as a product line or family. Aggregate resources could be total
number of workers, hours of machine time, or tons of raw materials.
Aggregate units of output could include gallons, feet, pounds of output, as well
as aggregate units appearing in service industries such as hours of service
delivered, number of patients seen, etc.
Aggregate planning does not distinguish among sizes, colours, features, and so
forth. For example, with automobile manufacturing, aggregate planning would
consider the total number of cars planned for not the individual models,
colours, or options. When units of aggregation are difficult to determine (for
example, when the variation in output is extreme) equivalent units are usually
determined. These equivalent units could be based on value, cost, worker
hours, or some similar measure.

Aggregate planning is considered to be intermediate-term (as opposed to long-

or short-term) in nature. Hence, most aggregate plans cover a period of three
to 18 months. Aggregate plans serve as a foundation for future short-range
type planning, such as production scheduling, sequencing, and loading. The
master production schedule (MPS) used in material requirements planning
(MRP) has been described as the aggregate plan "disaggregated."
Steps taken to produce an aggregate plan begin with the determination of
demand and the determination of current capacity. Capacity is expressed as
total number of units per time period that can be produced (this requires that
an average number of units be computed since the total may include a product
mix utilizing distinctly different production times). Demand is expressed as
total number of units needed. If the two are not in balance (equal), the firm
must decide whether to increase or decrease capacity to meet demand or
increase or decrease demand to meet capacity. In order to accomplish this, a
number of options are available.

Options for situations in which demand needs to be increased in order to

match capacity include:
1. Varying pricing to increase demand in periods when demand is less
than peak. For example, matinee prices for movie theatres, off-season
rates for hotels, weekend rates for telephone service, and pricing for
items that experience seasonal demand.
2. Advertising, direct marketing, and other forms of promotion are used to
shift demand.
3. Back ordering. By postponing delivery on current orders demand is shifted
to period when capacity is not fully utilized. This is really just a form of
smoothing demand. Service industries are able to smooth demand by taking
reservations or by making appointments in an attempt to avoid walk-in
customers. Some refer to this as "partitioning" demand.
4. New demand creation. A new, but complementary demand is created for a
product or service. When restaurant customers have to wait, they are
frequently diverted into a complementary (but not complimentary) service, the
bar. Other examples include the addition of video arcades within movie
theatres, and the expansion of services at convenience stores.
Options which can be used to increase or decrease ca pacity to match current
demand include:
1. Hire/lay off. By hiring additional workers as needed or by laying off workers
not currently required to meet demand, firms can maintain a balance between
capacity and demand.
2. By asking or requiring workers to work extra hours a day or an extra day per
week, firms can create a temporary increase in capacity without the added
expense of hiring additional workers.
3. Part-time or casual labor. By utilizing temporary workers or casual labor
(workers who are considered permanent but only work when needed, on
an on-call basis, and typically without the benefits given to full-time
workers).
4. Finished-goods inventory can be built up in periods of slack demand and
then used to fill demand during periods of high demand. In this way no new
workers have to be hired, no temporary or casual labor is needed, and no
overtime is incurred.
5. Frequently firms choose to allow another manufacturer or service provider
to provide the product or service to the subcontracting firm's customers. By
subcontracting work to an alternative source, additional capacity is temporarily
obtained.
6. Cross-training. Cross-trained employees may be able to perform tasks
in several operations, creating some flexibility when scheduling capacity.
7. Other methods. While varying workforce size and utilization, inventory
buildup/backlogging, and subcontracting are well-known alternatives, there
are other, more novel ways that find use in industry. Among these options are
sharing employees with counter-cyclical companies and attempting to find
interesting and meaningful projects for employees to do during slack times.

Master Production Schedule

A Master Production Schedule is a Schedule of the completions of the end
items and these completions are very much planned in nature. Master
production schedule acts as a very distinct and important linkage between the
planning processes. With the help of this schedule, one can know the
requirements for the individual end items by date and quantity. In companies,
MPS are generally produced in order to know the number of each product that
is to be made over some planning horizon. This schedule forms a very unique
part of the company's sales program which deals with the planned response to
the demands of the market.
A master production schedule is also in management language referred to as
the master of all the schedules as this schedule provides the production,
planning, purchasing & top management, the most needed information
required for planning and control of the whole manufacturing process or the
operation.
Master production scheduling plays an important role in the balancing of
demand with the supply i.e., satisfying customers according to the limits of the
factory and the supplier's base. MPS is used to know the number of the items
that are to be produced, the planned inventories of raw materials, finished
products and parts etc.
MPS tells the company what is to be made or produced and also refers to the
time in which this production of the products is to be completed. It must be
kept in mind that MPS does not act as a sales forecast or as a manufacturing
schedule or a wish list or a final assembly schedule. MPS can be linked only
with the final products and not with the planning involving the production of
parts or the components, as these listings require very detailed planning — so
these are left to the other plans that will follow this schedule.

In MPS, inputs are used to draw a master production schedule and the inputs
used are — orders from customers, production plan from aggregate planning,
forecast, resources that are available, inventory levels and the capacity
constraints. While drawing a MPS, quantities of individual items must be equal
to the aggregate quantities from the production plan and also the total
requirements for a product must be overtime in a very good manner.
MPS outputs include — the amounts that are to be produced, due dates,
quantity that is available to promise with the projected available balance. MPS
is a schedule that expresses the operations plan of production for a specific
period of time only and is stated in terms of the end items, which may be
either shippable products or the highest level assemblies used to make them.

The main steps in master production schedule can be summarized as —

1. Forming a preliminary MPS.
2. Performing rough — cut capacity planning.
3. Resolving differences.
Objectives of Master Production Schedule (MPS)
1. Keeping the inventories at the desired level by making perfect use of
the resources that are available with the company.
2. Setting up due dates for the availability of the end items and also providing
the required information regarding resources and also the materials — which
act as the supporting pillars of the aggregate planning.
3. Maintaining properly, the desired level of customer service.
4. Setting particular schedules for the production of the parts and the
components that are used as the inputs to materials requirements planning,
in the end items.

Materials requirements Planning (MRP l)

In manufacturing, developing a plan for your resources is vital to your
operation. Without resource planning, your operation will have a much more
challenging time managing various areas within your supply chain such as
inventory, production, and output. This is why utilizing a materials requirement
planning (MRP) system can efficiently manage materials within production,
making it much easier for project managers to order and organize materials
waiting to be assembled.
Through materials requirement planning (MRP), the need for manual materials
planning is eliminated and the system is able to successfully carry out an
efficient strategy. MRP has become a vital component in allowing
manufacturers to keep up with a consistently growing demand.

Material Requirement Planning (MRP) Functions

Utilizing a systemic approach, the system is able to efficiently keep production
up to schedule through data analysis and simple integration. Although the
system cannot run a production facility all on its own, it still is able to maintain
a steady flow of materials throughout the supply chain through decision-
making capabilities. Various functions of an MRP system include the following:
• Inventory Management: Arguably the main objective of an MRP system, the
feature is to ensure that materials are available at a moment's notice. This
eliminates the need for manual-entered data and is able to carry out material
orders with ease. It also is able to alert the facility when products are ready to
be delivered.
• Cost Reduction: In correlation with inventory management, cost is reduced
significantly. Through ensuring a steady flow of inventory, holding and
untimely-delivery cost are reduced, ultimately bringing more revenue into the
operation.
• Production Optimization: Although the main goal of MRP is to oversee and
manage materials, it benefits the rest of the system as well. As materials are
flowing throughout the supply chain, equipment and employees are able to
work at a much faster and efficient rate as well.
Implementing an MRP system can be extremely beneficial to your production
facility, but as mentioned previously, the system is not enough by itself. As
manufacturers are looking for ways to enhance production, many are coming
to the same solution — advanced planning and scheduling software (APS).

Advanced Planning and Scheduling (APS) with Materials Requirements

Planning (MRP)
Advanced planning and scheduling software (APS) can be integrated with an
MRP system with ease. Through diverse features, APS software offers as an
extension of your MRP system and can efficiently optimize production within
your facility. Various features of APS include the following:
• Resource Scheduling
• Schedule Optimization
• Capacity Planning
• Order Management

Capacity planning: Concept, Types

Capacity planning refers to determining what kind of labour and equipment
capacities are required and when they are required. Capacity is usually planned
on the basis of labour or machine hours available within the plant. Thus,
capacity planning is planning for quantity or scale of output.
There are four major considerations in capacity planning:
1. Level of demand
2. Cost of production
3. Availability of funds
4. Management policy.
Production has no meaning unless its products can be sold at a remunerative
price. Generally, the capacity of plant is limited by the level of current demand.
Stable demand makes the task of capacity planning simple while fluctuations in
demand create problems concerning the acquisition of resources and matching
them up with demand levels. Estimation of demand is, therefore, the first step
in capacity planning. Size of the market depends upon the sales potential
rather than on the geographical areas.
Importance of Capacity Planning
Capacity planning is important due to the following reasons:
1. Capacity limits the rate of output. Therefore, capacity planning
determines the ability of an enterprise to meet future demand for its
products and services.
2. Capacity influences the operating costs. Capacity is determined on the basis
of estimated demand. Actual demand is often different from estimated
demand. As a result, there arises excess capacity or under capacity. Excess or
idle capacity increases the cost per unit of output. Whereas under capacity
results in the loss of sales.
3. Capacity decisions leave a direct impact on the amount of fixed investment
made initially.
4. Capacity decisions result in long-term commitment of funds. Such long-term
decisions cannot be reversed except at major costs.
The following concepts of capacity are involved in capacity planning:
1. Design Capacity: It refers to the maximum output that can possibly be
produced in a given period of time. It is the ideal situation.
2. Effective Capacity: Refers to the maximum possible output, given the
changes in product mix, machine maintenance, scheduling and operating
problems, labour problems, etc. It is usually less than the design capacity.
3. Actual Output: It is the rate of output actually achieved. It cannot exceed
effective capacity due to machine breakdowns, labour absenteeism, irregular
supply of raw materials, unusual delay in supply of equipment, power
breakdown, etc.
The effectiveness of a production system (system effectiveness) can be
measured in two ways:
1. Efficiency which is the rate of actual output to effective output, and
2. Utilization which implies the rate of actual output to the design capacity.
Capacity Planning Classification
Capacity planning based on the timeline is classified into three main categories
long range, medium range and short range.
Long Term Capacity: Long range capacity of an organization is dependent on
various other capacities like design capacity, production capacity, sustainable
capacity and effective capacity. Design capacity is the maximum output
possible as indicated by equipment manufacturer under ideal working
condition.
Production capacity is the maximum output possible from equipment under
normal working condition or day.
Sustainable capacity is the maximum production level achievable in realistic
work condition and considering normal machine breakdown, maintenance, etc.
Effective capacity is the optimum production level under pre-defined job and
work-schedules, normal machine breakdown, maintenance, etc.
Medium Term Capacity: The strategic capacity planning undertaken by
organization for 2 to 3 years of a time frame is referred to as medium term
capacity planning.
Short Term Capacity: The strategic planning undertaken by organization for a
daily weekly or quarterly time frame is referred to as short term capacity
planning.
Capacity Planning Strategies
There are three primary strategies companies use to perform capacity
planning. Each comes with its own set of advantages and drawbacks, so you'll
need to think carefully about which one is most appropriate for your company:
• Lead Strategy: The Lead Strategy is the most aggressive of the three
approaches to capacity planning. Here, the company increases its production
capacity in advance of anticipated increases in demand. Some companies use
the Lead Strategy as a way to lure customers away from competitors,
especially if a competitor is vulnerable to inventory shortages when demand
skyrockets. The big risk with the Lead Strategy is that the anticipated increase
in demand never materializes and you are stuck with excess inventory.
• Lag Strategy: The Lag Strategy is much more conservative than the Lead
Strategy. Instead of increasing capacity in anticipation of suspected increases
in demand, the Lag Strategy responds to actual increases in demand by
boosting capacity after the operation is running at full steam. Although you
won't accumulate excess inventory, the time it takes to ramp up production
can result in the loss of customers to the competition.
• Match Strategy: The Match Strategy is the middle road between the Lead
and Lag Strategies. Rather than substantially boosting capacity based on
expected or actual increases in demand, the Match Strategy emphasizes small,
incremental modifications to capacity based on changing conditions in the
marketplace. Even though this strategy takes more effort and is harder to
accomplish, it is much more risk-averse than other capacity planning options.

Shop floor Control overview

The Business dictionary defines shop floor as "The area in a manufacturing
facility where assembly or production is carried out, either by an automated
system or by workers or a combination of both. The shop floor may include
equipment, inventory and storage areas."
Shop floor is the place where design specifications are referred, machinery and
manufacturing equipment are employed for production, parts are assembled
or some raw material is processed. The shop floor is responsible to produce an
intermediate or a final product.
Components of a Shop Floor
Here are some important com ponents of a shop floor:
• Material: This is either a man-made material or a natural resource. Material
is a vital part which is used to make or develop some product.
• Machinery, Equipment and Tools: Depending on the sector of production,
there are various mechanical, electrical, electronic and thermal equipment
along with various tools used on the shop floor. This factor speeds up the
production and improves productivity of the business.
• Information Technology: Today's shop floors are equipped with Shop Floor
Control Systems (SFC), Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES),
Manufacturing Operations Management (MOM) Software, Quality
Management Software (QMS), Real Time Data Retrieval from shop floor
operations, and other such simulators.
• Quality Control: When the product is ready, it is required to undergo certain
quality tests and criteria to meet customer satisfaction. The Quality Control
Section of a shop floor ensures that the product is flawless and up to the
customer's satisfaction.
• Store Room: It stores spare parts and other such inventories. If there is an
appropriate store room layout, its management is shrewd and there are proper
SOPs in place, it will certainly reduce operational costs to quite an extent. An
up-to-date store helps to predict the budget accurately.
• Staff: Skilled and experienced staff is a great contributor to successful
production on the shop floor. Such staff can work with minimal errors and
maximum perfection.

Benefits of Shop Floor Management

• Increased operational efficiency through standardization of operations.
• Reduction in occurrence of errors in work.
• Revealing of loopholes in production or processes.
• Increases productivity of the staff.
• Positive impact on the revenue of a manufacturing business.
Objectives of Shop Floor Management
• Routing movement of material on shop floor appropriately.
• Sequencing the procedures and processes taking place on shop floor.
• Scheduling of workforce, resources and operations.
• Finding deviation from standard procedures and processes.
• Identifying loopholes in shop floor communication.

S.No. Term and Meaning

1 Batch

The quantity of goods produced at one time

2 Computer Numeric Control (CNC)

It is automation of machine tools, which operate by precise

programmed commands in contrast to manual control by
hand wheels or levers.
3 Glass Wall

Being on a clear path but choosing a wrong entrance to be

on that path.
4 Just in Time (JIT)
It is same as lean manufacturing.
5 Kanban

A Japanese inventory control system to control supply chain.

6 Lean

It is a business philosophy that means executing things as sim

ply and cheaply as possible while
providing best quality and fast service.
7 Lean Manufacturing

Manufacturing by increased efficiency and productivity, and

decreasing waste.
8 Red Tag system

It is a communication tool in the form of red colored paper

tags. It is used to identify items that a
 shop floor person has tagged for removal from the work
area.
9 Shop Floor Inventory

It is the list of goods and material a shop floor holds for

repair, resale, manufacturing, assembling,
or processing for a length of time.
10 Waste

It is something that adds no value. The manufacturing waste

due to overproduction, over
processing, defects, unengaged employees, waiting time,
transportation, inventory, and motion.

Overview of Automatic identification and Data Capture

Automatic identification and data capture (AI DC) refers to the methods of
automatically identifying objects, collecting data about them, and entering
them directly into computer systems, without human involvement.
Technologies typically considered as part of AIDC include QR codes, bar codes,
radio frequency identification (RFID), biometrics (like iris and facial recognition
system), magnetic stripes, optical character recognition (OCR), smart cards,
and voice recognition. AIDC is also commonly referred to as "Automatic
Identification", "Auto-ID" and "Automatic Data Capture".
AIDC is the process or means of obtaining external data, particularly through
analysis of images, sounds or videos. To capture data, a transducer is
employed which converts the actual image or a sound into a digital file. The file
is then stored and at a later time it can be analyzed by a computer, or
compared with other files in a database to verify identity or to provide
authorization to enter a secured system. Capturing of data can be done in
various ways; the best method depends on application.
In biometric security systems, capture is the acquisition of or the process of
acquiring and identifying characteristics such as finger image, palm image,
facial image, iris print or voice print which involves audio data and the rest all
involves video data.
Radio-frequency identification is relatively a new A1 DC technology which was
first developed in 1980s. The technology acts as a base in automated data
collection, identification and analysis systems worldwide. RFID has found its
importance in a wide range of markets, including livestock identification and
Automated Vehicle Identification (AVI) systems because of its capability to
track moving objects. These automated wireless AIDC systems are effective in
manufacturing environments where barcode labels could not survive.
One of the most useful application tasks of data capture is collecting
information from paper documents and saving it into databases (CMS, ECM
and other systems). There are several types of basic technologies used for data
capture according to the data type:

 OCR: for printed text recognition

 ICR: for hand-printed text recognition
 OMR: for marks recognition
 OBR: for barcodes recognition
 BCR: for barcode recognition
 DLR: for document layer recognition

These basic technologies allow extracting information from paper documents

for further processing it in the enterprise information systems such as ERP,
CRM and others.
The documents for data capture can be divided into 3 groups: structured, semi
-structured and unstructured.
• Structured documents (questionnaires, tests, insurance forms, tax returns,
ballots, etc.) have completely the same structure and appearance. It is the
easiest type for data capture, because every data field is located at the same
place for all documents.
• Semi-structured documents (invoices, purchase orders, waybills, etc.) have
the same structure but their appearance depends on number of items and
other parameters. Capturing data from these documents is a complex, but
solvable task.
• Unstructured documents (letters, contracts, articles, etc.) could be flexible
with structure and appearance.
Barcode Technology
Barcode Readers and Scanners
A BCR (barcode reader) or scanner, also known as a POS (point of sale) scanner
is a hardware input device capable of reading a barcode using a laser. It can
also print out the details of the product or log information about that product
into a database. A perfect example of a barcode reader is a supermarket
barcode scanner that reads and logs the price of a product.
Today, many smartphones with the proper apps are also capable of scanning
and reading barcodes.
Like all other input devices, a barcode reader is bringing in (inputting)
information from the outside world into a computer or other electronic device,
which makes it an input device. If the barcode reader also has a screen that
displays (outputs) results or prints results, it would be considered an
input/output device.
A barcode printer is a hardware device capable of printing adhesive barcodes
that can be attached to a product to identify it and help keep inventory.

Radio frequency identification

Radio-frequency identification (RFID) uses electromagnetic fields to
automatically identify and track tags attached to objects. An RFID tag consists
of a tiny radio transponder; a radio receiver and transmitter. When triggered
by an electromagnetic interrogation pulse from a nearby RFID reader device,
the tag transmits digital data, usually an identifying inventory number, back to
the reader. This number can be used to inventory goods. There are two types.
Passive tags are powered by energy from the RFID reader's interrogating radio
waves. Active tags are powered by a battery and thus can be read at a greater
range from the RFID reader; up to hundreds of meters. Unlike a barcode, the
tag doesn't need to be within the line of sight of the reader, so it may be
embedded in the tracked object. RFID is one method of automatic
identification and data capture (AIDC).
RFID tags are used in many industries. For example, an RFID tag attached to an
automobile during production can be used to track its progress through the
assembly line; RFID-tagged pharmaceuticals can be tracked through
warehouses; and implanting RFID in livestock and pets enables positive
identification of animals.
Since RFID tags can be attached to cash, clothing, and possessions, or
implanted in animals and people, the possibility of reading personally- linked
information without consent has raised serious privacy concerns. These
concerns resulted in standard specifications development addressing privacy
and security issues. ISO/IEC 18000 and ISO/IEC 29167 use on-chip cryptography
methods for untraceability, tag and reader authentication, and over-the-air
privacy. ISO/IEC 20248 specifies a digital signature data structure for RFID and
barcodes providing data, source and read method authenticity. This work is
done within ISO/IEC JTC I/SC 31 Automatic identification and data capture
techniques. Tags can also be used in shops to expedite checkout, and to
prevent theft by customers and employees.

In 2014, the world RFID market was worth USS8.89 billion, up from USS7.77
billion in 2013 and USS6.96 billion in 2012. This figure includes tags, readers,
and software/services for RFID cards, labels, fobs, and all other form factors.
The market value is expected to rise to USS18.68 billion by 2026.

RFID can be used in a variety of applications, such as:

• Access management
• Tracking of goods
• Tracking of persons and animals
• Toll collection and contactless payment
• Machine readable travel documents
• Smartdust (for massively distributed sensor networks)
• Airport baggage tracking logistics
• Timing sporting events
• Tracking and billing processes
RFID tags, a technology once limited to tracking cattle, are tracking consumer
products worldwide. Many manufacturers use the tags to track the location of
each product they make from the time it's made until it's pulled off the shelf
and tossed in a shopping cart.
Outside the realm of retail merchandise, RFID tags are tracking vehicles, airline
passengers, Alzheimer's patients and pets. Soon, they may even track your
preference for chunky or creamy peanut butter. Some critics say RFID
technology is becoming too much a part of our lives that is, if we are even
aware of all parts of our lives that is affects.