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4.1 Facilities Planning and Plant Layout PDF
4.1 Facilities Planning and Plant Layout PDF
Facility planning (land, buildings, equipment, furnishings) provides the physical capability to add value. Facilities are expensive. Their lifetime is in decades. They take years to commission. By their nature, they are one of the most important strategic elements of a business enterprise. This is why facility design and the strategic thinking that should precede it are so important. Many symptoms of inappropriate business architecture appear as layout or material handling issues. A properly designed facility is an important source of competitive advantage. It can: Operate At Low Cost Provide Fast Delivery Accommodate Frequent New Products Produce Many Varied Products Produce High or Low Volume Products Produce At The Highest Quality Level Provide Unique Services Or Features
These are examples of what Wickham Skinner called "Key Manufacturing Tasks."
Levels of Detail help organize facility planning into manageable sub-projects. Each sub-project has a series of tasks that the design team must complete. The tasks and their sequence differ for each level. These levels are:
I Global (Site Location) II Supra (Site Planning) III Macro (Building Layout) IV Micro (Workcell/Department Layout) V Sub-Micro (Workstation Design)
At the Global level, we select a site location. This involves factors such as freight cost, labor cost, skill availability and site focus. At the Supra-Layout level we plan the site. This includes number, size, and location of buildings. It includes infrastructure such as roads, water, gas and rail. This plan should look ahead to plant expansions and eventual site saturation The Macro-Layout plans each building, structure or other sub-unit of the site. Operatingdepartments are defined and located at this level. Frequently, this is the most important level of planning. A Macro-Layout institutionalizes the fundamental organizational structure in steel and concrete.
The Micro Level IV determines the location of specific equipment and furniture. The emphasis shifts from gross material flow to personal space and communication. Socio-Technical considerations dominate. The sub micro level focuses on individual workers. Here we design workstations for efficiency, effectiveness and safety. Ergonomics is key. Ideally, the design progresses from Global to Sub-Micro in distinct, sequential phases. At the end of each phase, the design is "frozen" by consensus.
This settles the more global issues first. It allows smooth progress without continually revisiting unresolved issues. It prevents detail from overwhelming the project.
Level
Output
I Global II Supra III Macro Layout IV Micro Layout V Sub Micro Layout
Site Planning
Site
Building
Cells or Departments
Workstation Design
Workstation
The goal of product selection is to find compatible families of products which a group of machines can process without undo changeovers or other difficulties that result from attempting too much variety. Important tools are Process Mapping and Group Technology.
Engineering the process requires a deep understanding of every process event as well as the times required for setup, personnel activities and machine cycles. From this we calculate the number of people required and the number of machines or workstations.
Infrastructural elements support the process but do not touch the product. They are many and varied. Examples are: Containers Scheduling Balance Methods Motivation Infrastructure is intangible and cell designs often fail due to lack of awareness about it.
Download Workcell Design Preview Chapter from Quarterman Lee's Latest Book for 67 pages of detailed info
The fourth task in workcell design is the physical layout. This is often straightforward if the previous tasks have been done thoughtfully. The Task Procedure diagrams can often be simplified. In many cases you may start with the process chart and move directly to a layout.
Workstation Design
Facility Design at Level V
At the level of workstation design, Ergonomics and Motion Economy dominate the design. Motion Economy maximizes individual productivity by making tasks faster and easier. Ergonomics optimizes the integration of people with equipment. It also ensures that workers can perform the task with minimal risk of injury. The figure below shows the tasks required to properly design a workstation along with their sequence. Task 05.02 is information acquisition. The designer needs information on products, processes, equipment, tools, components and other items. The next task group defines the process and allocate functions to machines or people. This is where automation and mechanization decisions are made. The final task group places elements into a spatial arrangement. It parallels tasks at other levels of plant layout. An experienced designer performs many of these steps informally or mentally. The process is not as complex or lengthy as the charts indicate. However, failure to perform a step results in design by accident, a risky proposition.
Design Procedure