Author :
Pei, Ling ; Li, Feng ; Lin, Fuquan ; Wang, Wei
Author_Institution :
Dept.of mechanical engineering, Hubei Automotive Industries Institute, Shiyan City, China
Abstract :
Proplanner´s Line Balancing Alone compared with doing the line balancing studies in MS Excel can create the most efficient single and mixed model lines quickly and easily, and simultaneously balance the individual spreadsheets of tasks, stations, resources, operators, precedence, models, parts while minimizing errors often found during deployment. But it doesn´t make automatically quick and easy work of generating accurate walk path diagrams, calculating model specific workplace cycle times, evaluating lean work content, and/or certifying workplace ergonomic safety. As often designed workplaces in which one or more operators are required to walk around and interact with parts, products, machines and each other, the Line Balancing Alone should be downloaded the design scenarios to the popular Workplace Planner application so that it can automatically evaluate the model sequence to the line, calculate station cycle times and diagram operator walk paths in AutoCAD. Workplace Planner provides a quick and simple way to diagram and quantify the flow of people and products within an AutoCAD-drawn workplace, based upon a task routing entered into the application, or imported from a spreadsheet like MS Excel. Incorporating predetermined process languages and process times specified in decimal minutes or seconds. The paper focuses on integrating with the Line Balancing application, the Workplace Planner can evaluate and animate an entire production line that utilizes machine and/or operator synchronized tasks and mixed model sequenced production by showing an application in an automotive manufacturing.