Hi HERMAN
I did not see any financial opinions so I thought I would offer one. The goal of the company is to make money, how you achieve that has many variables. Buying new equipment when the existing will do the job costs big money, provided the existing equipment is not a bottleneck. The bottleneck is simply what ever is the constraint that controls the overall output of the line or the plant. Based on what you stated it appears that you believe you have the wrong machine because of the long changeover times. but I think you have more that 50%of your capacity is done time. You Pick and Place machine should be up placing parts at least 80% of the time
I would do several things. 1. determine if you could toss all the current rules at your factory about setting up and changing over a line.
2. Prestage all the feeders needed for the next job with full reels, stop trying to send only the exact amount of parts onto the floor. You are not in the �control inventory business� you are in the manufacturing business. You will use what every you need to use to run the job and return the rest to stock. Stock telling you the maximum you will use is futile and is killing your bottom line. You can continue to work towards minimizing attrition but first get the job done efficiently.
3. When a job is almost done, have a programmer standing by the machine, a person to change the stencil screen, a feeder audit person if needed and a person to load raw boards.
4. The current job running stops.
5. Everyone does there job at the same time to complete all the changeover in a few minutes, feeders should take no more that 20 seconds each. The feeder auditor should be reviewing the work as it is happening, meaning the feeders that have been installed should be checked as soon as they are on the machine do not wait until all of them are on the machine.
6. about 15-20 minutes you should be up and running
7. Any problems everyone should be standing there to tweak anything.
8. Prestage feeders that will be needed during a reload, so reloads only take about 20 seconds each.
As my company specializes in this specific area I also suggest you goto our website. Check out Bliss University at http://www.blissindustries.com it explains in more detail how to use feeder, reel, and stencil carts to make this entire process easy.
I would be pleased to walk you through the entire process over the phone if you like, give me call
Ken Bliss Bliss Industries 510-490-8401
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