MECHENG 587 & MFG587

Global Manufacturing

Paradigms of Manufacturing
An Overview
September 3, 2020

Dr. Theodor Freiheit

Research Associate Professor
Department of Mechanical Engineering

Manufacturing Enterprise

Materials
Energy Products that
Design Make Satisfy
Information Societal Needs

Capital
Sell
Labor

Enabling Technologies
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 How many possible sequences for
Design — Make — Sell?
Manufacturing Paradigm
1. Craft Production (sell-design-make)
Pull-type business
model
Design 3. Mass Customization
(design-sell-make)

Sell 4. Personalized Production

(design-sell-design-make)
Buyer-driven product design at
mass-production price
Make
Push-type business
model
2. Mass Production (design-make-sell)

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History of Manufacturing
Beginning 10,000 to 20,000 years ago to ~ mid-late 1800’s

Age of Craftsmanship
– Each craftsman was responsible for a total production
process
• Skilled workers that use general purpose tools with human or animal
power to make exactly what the customer asks for
• Individual craftsman designed, selected materials, made the items
from beginning to finish, inspected the quality, and, possibly, sold the
finished goods.
• Heavily experience based operations.
– Craftsman took the pride of his quality and
craftsmanship.
– Usually the goods were traded locally.

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 Craft Production

High Variety/
Low Volume
Characterized by high choice of products. Typically – one of a kind
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Craft Production

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craft_production

Lack of systems
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 Craft-Production Paradigm
Craft-production in automotive
flourished in Europe during the
second part of the 19th Century

TOTAL PRODUCTION:
~1000 automobiles/yr.

Enablers of Craft-Production:
• Skilled workforce
• General purpose tools and machines

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History of Manufacturing

Beginning sixteenth to eighteenth centuries to now

The age of mechanization
• The Industrial Revolution
– Machine-dominated factory with
discipline
– Analytical study of production
process and scientific management
• Production of standardized
products in very high volume
reduces production cost, which,
in turn, allows price reduction.
– Reduced product prices increases
demand and sales.

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 Interchangeability

Interchangeability is the ability to rapidly replace existing components

with ‘identical’ replicas. Interchangeability allows easy assembly of new
devices, and easier repair of existing devices, while minimizing both the
time and skill required of the person doing the assembly or repair.

Honoré Blanc: French gunsmith that pioneered interchangeable parts.

• Standardized muskets via cut-and-try methods using jigs, gauges or master
models
• Components are referenced to each other via datums (the idea of the datum
was also developed in an armory)
• Took idea to Thomas Jefferson (American Ambassador to France) who took
the concept to Pres. George Washington
• 1798 a contract was issued to Eli Whitney for 10,000 muskets in 2 years.
Current production rate was <1500/year.

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Interchangeability

http://www.eliwhitney.org

Eli Whitney

Manufacturing Science and Technology

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 Mass Production
Low Variety/
High Volume

Characterized by limited variety of standardized products and low-cost production

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Assembly Systems and Mass Production

Model-T Production (Highland Park:~1910)

Henry Ford Moving Assembly Line
Pre-1912 20-30 per day
1913 100 per day
1914 1000 per day
1915 3000 per day

Interchangeable parts
Moving assembly lines
Division of labor/Scientific
management
Vertical integration

Economy of Scale
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 Mass Production Characteristics
• Manufacturing operations are departmentalized –
Division of Labor.
– Repetitive operations carried out by each worker.
• Worker no longer see the end product
– lose the sense of “being responsible” for the quality of the
products.
– Hard transition from craft production
• Suitable for stable and “monochromatic” market.
• Usually has long product life cycles and
production runs.
• Can only accommodate stabilized engineering
designs.
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Outgrowth of Mass Production:

Lean Production
Lean manufacturing: the goal of the expenditure of
resources is the creation of value for the end
customer; otherwise it is wasteful and a target for
elimination.
Value is defined as any action or process that a
customer would be willing to pay for.
Main objectives
– Eliminate waste from production system to reduce
the overall cost and achieve and assure product
quality
– Organize work based on human dignity, mutual
trust and support, and allowing workers to realize
their potential
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 Lean Manufacturing

• Based on Toyota Production System

– “Lean” coined in the book “The Machine That Changed
the World”

• Taiichi Ohno engineer in Toyota Motor Company:

father of TPS
• Post WWII, Japan rebuilding manufacturing
industry – how to make due with fewer resources
• U.S. successful with mass production, but
Japanese market smaller than U.S.

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Eight Types of Waste

1. Waste from overproduction

2. Waste of motion (operator or machine)
3. Transportation waste
4. Processing waste
5. Wasted time (queuing) – operator or
machine Discussion:
6. Defective products How have you experienced
7. Excess inventory or identified lean
manufacturing practices at
8. Under-utilized personnel your work?
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Lean Manufacturing Principles

• Value
– Define what is valuable to the customer. What is not of
value is waste: waste of resources and waste of profits
• Value Stream
– Identify the set of all specific actions that are required to
bring a product to market
• Flow
– How does value move through the company and
economy (including your suppliers & customers)
• Pull
– Let the customer “pull” the product from you – build to
order not to speculation
• Perfection
– Always work toward the ideal of zero waste
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Lean Tools
- How all the tools fit together ?

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 History of Manufacturing

Beginning 1950s to now

The age of information and automation

• The New Industrial Revolution
– Increasing use of computers for both information
processing and automatic control
– Emphasis not so much on the tool/machine
innovation and power utilization, but more on the
knowledge creation and “software” development
– Higher volume product variety increases

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Outgrowth of Automation:
Flexible Manufacturing
• Customer demand is becoming individualistic
– More: product variation; product complexity; exacting quality
• Flexible manufacturing emphasizes flexibility in
addition to cost and quality.
• Advantage: small-batch production (low volume and high
variety) gains economic competitive edge
• Main features
– Machine flexibility through CNC equipment
– Routing flexibility with automated material handling devices
– Production flexibility.

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 Mass Customization
High Variety/
Middle Volumes

Characterized by many product options (variety), at near mass production cost with
smaller volume per option-product.
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Mass Customization

Un-upholstered Latitude upholstery Latitude on seat

on seat & back only
http://www.hermanmiller.com/

• Product family
• Management of variety
• Economy of scale and scope
BMW 7 Series • Demand for responsive 
1017 possible variants manufacturing systems

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 Mass-Customization
Production of a wide variety of customized products at close-
to mass production cost increases sales by penetrating to
new markets and appealing to new customers
Strategy 1: Off-the-shelf variety of customized products
Strategy 2: Standard options installed on customized
products

Enablers of Mass-Customization:
• Flexible Manufacturing system (FMS)
 with CNC machines, and Welding & Assembly Robots
• Modular products
• Marketing networks and customer-plant direct
communication
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Mass Customization Enabled by Assembly

Among the various

approaches to variety,
product family based
assembly is one of the most
cost effective.
• Manufacturer designs product
architecture and product
modules.
• Consumers select the
combinations.
• Economy of scale and scope

Hu, et al., 2011, “Assembly System Design

and Operations for Product Variety”,
Keynote paper, Annals of CIRP, Volume 60,
Issue 2, Pages 715-733.

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Mass Customization: Characteristics

• Product Family
– mass-customized products with similar function

• Part Family
– mass-customized parts of similar form and
function

• Variant
– product model within a family that possesses
augmenting features to differentiate it from
others ME587 Page 25

How to produce high variety at

mass-production cost?
• Convertibility
– ability to change the system functionality to
produce different types of products – addresses
variety (mix) requirement
• Scalability
– ability to change the system capacity to produce
different product volumes- addresses volume
requirement

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 Four Mass Customization Strategies
Comparing customization level (variety, volume), product cost and delivery time
Each customization type requires a different business model.

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History of Manufacturing
Beginning ~1990s to now
Road to Globalization
India was opened to direct foreign investment by “the economic
1991
liberalization package” that was initiated by Finance Minister Dr. Singh
(later became Prime Minister)
1993 The European Union Single Market “four freedoms” was created
1994 NAFTA was formed (in January)
1997 General Motors Shanghai (GMS) was established
1998 DaimlerChrysler was formed
1999 Ford India bought out a majority stake and started to produce several models
1992 - High-capacity fiber optic cable deployments around the world
2000
2001 China joined the World Trade Organization
2002 The Euro currency was introduced (on 1/1/02) in 12 countries of the EU.

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 Regionalization

High Variety/
Mid-Lower Volumes

Characterized by products designed to fit regional markets: tailored to culture,

tastes, needs and regulatory environment of each target area.
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Product Regionalization
• Examples:
 Different cars in different regions
 Different sizes of detergent of P&G
 McDonald’s food options
Middle East Europe Asia

McRice burger
Enablers of Regionalization:
• Global reach of corporations – local presence
• Sophisticated marketing research tools
• Efficient distribution systems
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 Personalized Production

High Variety/
Lower Volumes

Characterized by the customer-tailored products, designed by a particular customer,

from a database of modules, and produced to order.
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Personalized Production
• Buyer-tailored personal products
– designed by the buyer from a database of modules
or technologically enabled design tools
– assembled to order at mass-production cost
• The result may be: A Market-of-One
Enablers of Personalized-Production:
• Communication interface: Customer/Manufacturer interaction
• Customization processes: 3D printing, laser printing, etching
• Reconfigurable manufacturing facilities (more on this later)
• Access to diverse products: supply chain logistics

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Why is Personalization Possible?

• Diversification of consumers
• Democratization of design, manufacturing
and supply chains, enabled by the cyber
infrastructure, e.g., Alibaba.com
• Open architecture products and product
family design methods
• Development of responsive manufacturing
technologies and systems, e.g., additive
manufacturing

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Personalized Production
Design Phases
Phase1: Architecture Design Phase
Design (A): product architecture, envelope of product variety, and
module interfaces are designed by the manufacturer to fit their
facilities and strengths
Phase 2: Personalized Design Phase
Design (P): final tailored design takes place by customer or with close
interaction with the buyer/customer

Example: Contemporary Kitchen Designs

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Comparison of Paradigms

Mass  Personalized 
Mass Production
Customization Production
Scale
Scale
Production Goal Scale Scope
Scope
Value
Quality
Quality
Desired Product  Quality Cost
Cost
Characteristics Cost Variety
Variety
Efficacy
Design
Customer  Satisfy Need Choose 
Choose
Role Buy Buy
Buy

Production  Dedicated  Mfg  Reconfigurable Mfg  On‐Demand Mfg 

System Systems (DMS) Systems (RMS) Systems (OMS)

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