Material flow analysis of automotive assembly plants using FactoryFLOW

When designing a new assembly plant or retrofitting an existing plant, it is critical to determine where all the materials will be received, stored and used. Variable width and color material flow diagrams created by FactoryFLOW are especially useful for presenting this information. FactoryFLOW automatically finds the shortest route from origin to destination along an aisle network for all materials/parts involved. Once routes are determined. FactoryFLOW draws the routes, outputs travel distances, times, and costs to report files and scales the thickness of flow lines according to the flow intensity of each part. The input data required by FactoryFLOW is the kind of basic from-to information typically already available in a database or spreadsheet. Among other output reports, FactoryFLOW generates detailed reports on manpower requirements by equipment type. FactoryFLOW´s from-to chart shows the flow intensities and distances between ail from-to locations analyzed. The distance intensity chart plots each part´s move intensity against its travel distance on an X-Y graph. With the help of powerful personal computer systems and user friendly graphical environments, material flow studies of over 10,000 parts within facilities of over 5 million square feet can be accomplished by a novice user in under an hour