IMPROVEMENT OF MATERIAL FEEDING

SYSTEM FOR AN EXCAVATOR ASSEMBLY

LINE THROUGH LEAN PRINCIPLES
Raghavendra Ramappa1, *K. M. Sharath Kumar2, Ashoka K. Nairy3
1
Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, M. S. Ramaiah School of Advanced Studies, Bangalore,
2
Department of Management Studies, M. S. Ramaiah School of Advanced Studies, Bangalore,
3
LEaP Caterpillar Logistics Technology Services India, Bangalore
*Contact Author e-mail: sharath@msrsas.org

Abstract
Today many industries are categorised by end customer demand for a wide variety of product models and variants.
Moreover, large number of product variants has implications on the material flows with in the assembly plants. This
requires logistics system that can support production in small lot size for excavator industry. Since, continuous material
feeding system resulted in increased inventory value, operator walk and search time, an attempt to increase production
throughput is made.
In this paper, best practice for material feeding system has been tested to support the assembly line with more
variants in end product. Existing continuous supply material feeding system has been studied to find the effects on
production hindering volume growth. Part flow, inventory and volume growth plan data have been collected and analysed
for effects on production time. Subsequently, operators walk time and distance have been analysed. Consequently,
alternate material feeding systems have been explored through literature. Model station analysis has been performed on
engine line to find the suitable material feeding system using simulation techniques. Finally, lean kitting supply system has
been tested through warehouse zoning and re-profiling activity.
Hence, continuous supply system has been replaced by lean kitting supply system. Results showed reduction of line
side storage space by 69%, inventory value by 54.3%, operator walk time by 78.3% and line side replenishment by 29.6%.
This helped in achieving the takt time of four machines per day. Further, kitting gave flexibility to introduce five new
variants in the existing assembly line without any additional investments.
Keywords: Continuous Supply, Kitting, Inventory Level, Warehouse Zoning
Abbreviations searching time. According to TPS and Lean theories,
DES Discrete Event Simulation these issues are defined as waste and have to be reduced
JIT Just in Time or eliminated especially to increase the line capacity [2,
MHE Material Handling Equipment 3]. Hence, company wants to increase their assembly
POU Point of Use line capacity in order to manage model variation along
SCM Supply Chain Management with satisfying customer demand. In order to address
VSM Value Stream Mapping line side storage space and motion waste issues,
company is looking at new techniques to deliver
material. This project focuses mainly on developing
1. INTRODUCTION lean material feeding system to eliminate waste
operations at assembly line in order to achieve desired
The growing number of product variants that is takt time [2, 4].
reality for many manufacturing companies results in
more number of parts. These parts are to be delivered to
the assembly lines. Delivering them in the traditional
way with continuous supply becomes a problem since 2. PROBLEM
increase in number of parts demands an increase in line Caterpillar manufacturing introduced a new
side storage space [1]. An increase in storage space and product called excavator with single variant. Due to
part numbers create longer operator walking and search increased customer demand for more variants, the
time for parts at assembly line. Currently, Caterpillar company decided to introduce four more variants and
Excavator Division is assembling one of the product increase assembly line capacity from two machines per
types. The machine is assembled in an assembly line day to four machines per day. However, the existing
and method of delivering parts to the assembly line is material feeding system proved to be difficult to achieve
continuous supply system. Meaning all parts that are the given takt time. Continuous supply system or line
used for assembly are stored in Kanban system at line side storing system proved impractical to cope up with
side. The variation in the end product causes the line 500 extra parts, thus, leading to increase in search time
side stores to keep high inventory of different part and walk movements. As the line side stock increased,
numbers even though usage of some parts are very low. the inventory value increased more than the estimated
Increase in assembly capacity demands more line side plan. So, the company is looking for alternate material
space, which currently does not exists. Besides using feeding system, which supports the production. The
big line side space, increases operator walking and

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work reported in this paper aims at improving the excessive storing which according to Lean theory is
material feeding system for an excavator assembly line called as waste.
to assemble four machines per day and reduce line side
inventory value by 50%. Decanting (Re-packaging) of Parts: Suppliers were not
delivering parts in right kanban quantities and in right
The scope of the work is to analyse and packaging that fits line side stores. This was the reason
recommend reliable material feeding system, which why parts had to be replaced after receiving. This not
helps to reduce line side storage space by 70%, line side only involves time but also involves cost for this
replenishment by 20%, line side inventory value by additional operation. This additional handling may
50% and operator walking time by 75%. The paper also cause quality defects.
brings out methods to improve warehouse process that
supports new material feeding system. Further the Big Line side Stores: Since company is following
feasibility of the process has been validated before continuous supply system, all parts were stored at line
implementation. side and even some parts were used less frequently. This
was a main problem having more parts at line side
2.1 Methodology which was consuming more space. This results in time
consuming operations for operators to walk and search
Product, process, materials and inventory
for parts required for assembly. This was against the
related data has been collected and analysed to theory of 5S vioalting Lean rules. This was directly
understand the current situation. Alternate lean material affecting end product throughput time.
feeding system has been analysed and tested for benefits
using model station analysis. In continuation, Unstandardised Work: Since parts picking is a laborious
warehouse-zoning activity has been performed to job for the operators, they started collecting parts in
eliminate waste replenishment movement to line side. batches required for one shift and this affected the
Finally, Material Handling Equipment (MHE) analysis standard work which in turn affected end product
has been carried out for best utilisation. Lastly, viability quality.
of the attained solution has been validated using
Discrete Event Simulation (DES) for aisle congestion As a part of next step, space analysis has been
and material flow. done for the assembly line and found that 75% of the
stations have space constraints due to addition of new
variants as depicted in Figure 2.
3. PROBLEM ANALYSIS
Data has been collected to analyse the current
continuous material feeding system in an excavator
assembly line. Parts, inventory and volume plan
information became the primary data for the analysis.
Figure 1 shows the effects of current material feeding
system.

Fig. 2 Space analysis report

In addition, storage space constraint in engine line has
been shown in Fig. 3. By virtue of this analysis, root
cause of the problem has been identified. So, finding
alternate material feeding system has been considered as
the solution procedure, which can be tested on one
model station to analyse improvements.
Fig. 1 Effects of current material feeding system
Part Shortages: The biggest issue with which assembly
had been getting affected was getting right part at right
time in Point of Use (POU). This has got many reasons
inbuilt with the feeding system and led to poor material
planning due to lack of visibility, supplier delays, poor
response time when replenishing line side and poor
inventory control. Many times part shortages were
known when the part was required for assembly.
Poor Kanban Quantity: Line side storage is poorly
balanced. Some parts had one week worth of inventory
at line side and the next part had only 3 days worth of
inventory. This poorly balanced inventory level leads to
Fig. 3 Storage space constraint in engine line

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4. SOLUTION PROCEDURE Now, collated data has been used for
comparing the kitting benefits with different category of
Engine line consisting of 197 parts has been parts.
considered for model station analysis. Now the question
is to decide on the parts, which are eligible for kitting. Number of times parts getting replenished at line side
As discussed earlier, 100% kitting is not a good (LR):
decision, unless company has some reason to bare
additional logistics cost [5, 6]. So, decision to select the If parts are stored at line side:
category of parts [7-13] for kitting analysis has been
LR=N Kp D / Q ................. (1)
reported in table 1.
If parts are kitted
Table 1. Category of parts taken for kitting analysis
LR=Kpk PD/(Kpk N) ................. (2)
Sl. No. Scenario
Stores replenishment per day (SR):
1 All selected parts kitted If part stored at line side
2 All standard parts kitted SR=NKpD/Q .................. (3)

3 All hand weight mandatory parts kitted If parts are kitted

SR=Kpk D/Q .................. (4)
4 All mandatory and selected parts kitted
2
Line side storage space (LS) in m :
5 All parts less than Rs. 50,000/- kitted
If part stored at line side
6 All hand weight parts kitted LS=NKpS ................... (5)
7 All parts kitted If part is kitted

8 No parts kitted LS=0 .................... (6)

2
Kitting Space (KS) in m :
Where,
If part stored at line side
Hand weight parts = Parts < 8kg
Standard parts = Parts that goes on every engine KS=0 ..................... (7)
Mandatory parts = Parts that goes on every engine but If part is kitted
different variables are available
KS=Kpk S ..................... (8)
Selectable parts = Parts that can be selected to go on to
engine (E.g. A/C) Operator walking distance to pick the part (WT):
For model data input, let If part is stored at line side
PD: End product demand per day in numbers WT=2NKp D (W/OV) / 60 ............... (9)
S: Line side storage in m2 If part is kitted
V: Value in Rupees of part, i.e. purchasing cost
for supplier WT=2Kpk D (KW/OV) / 60 ............. (10)
Q: Kanban quantity of parts in numbers
U: Part usage in % Value of inventory of the parts (LV) assuming JIT
N: Number of parts supply without kit buffer):
D: Demand of parts per day, If parts stored at line side
Where, D=U N PD/100
W: Average walking distance in meters for the LV=NKp Q V .....................(11)
operator to pick part from line side store If part is kitted
KW: Average walking distance in m for the
operator to pick from kit (Estimated Distance: LV=Kpk VD WS/2PD...........(12)
0.5 m)
Number of times part has to be physically handled (PH):
TU: Type of usage for parts
BP: Business process parts If parts stored at line side
FP: Flow path parts
OV: Average walking speed of an operator (TPS PH=NKpD .........................(13)
Standard -1m/sec) If part is kitted
AP: Average time in the area to move the kit
container between different component PH=2Kpk D ....................... (14)
containers (Standard-0.5m/sec) Kitting time for part per day (KT):
WS: Number of work stations for engine assembly
Kp: Kitted parts If part stored at line side
Kpk: if part is kitted then Kpk = 1 else Kpk = 0
KT=0 ................... (15)
Npk: If part is not kitted Npk = 1 else Nkp = 0
If part is kitted

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 KT=PDKpkS/2KS + Kpk D AP/60 .... (16)

Analysis Report:

Fig. 9 Physical part handling per day

Fig. 4 Line side replenishment per day

Fig. 10 Kitting space

With above analysis, three scenarios has been
proved to be beneficial namely, All parts kitted, All
hand weight parts kitted and All parts less than
Fig. 5 Stores replenishment per day Rs.50,000/- kitted. Based on the logistics cost [14]
involved in additional material handling of all parts
kitted, the second scenario proved to be the optimal
solution for kitting operation. Comparing with the
existing continuous supply system, the result have been
validated and is shown in Figure 11.

Fig. 6 Line side storage space

Fig. 11 Hand weight parts vs. continuous supply

Analysis solutions revealed:
a) Reduction in line side replenishment by 39.13%
b) Reduction in line side storage space by 85.29%
Fig. 7 Operator walking time and kitting time c) Reduced operator walking time by 79%
d) Reduced line side inventory value by 71.42%
e) Stores replenishments remained same
f) Increase in physical part handling by 80%
The next step was to define the replenishment
process which follows kanban system where empty kit
cart or pallet will be trigger for next replenishment [15].
The mode of kitting all hand weight parts is called as kit
cart, which has been designed and reported in this paper
as shown in Figure 12.

Fig. 8 Line side inventory value

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 Fig. 12 Kit cart
The implementation of kitting showed the benefits
in engine line. This type of material feeding system as a Fig. 13 Parts Zoning Approach in Warehouse
combination of kitting and kanban replenishment has An analysis was carried out to find the parts, which
been implemented in all other stations of assembly line. fall under three categories namely: fast moving parts,
But, before that how much efficient is this kitting medium and slow moving parts. Based on this, fast
process is a big question. Since, kitting by itself is a moving parts contributed up to 75% of the warehouse
non-value added operation. There is a requirement to parts. Accordingly, warehouse rack sections were
plan the process in an effective way. Thus, Lean kitting modified with three zones (Figure 14)
has been viewed as next approach.
Approach to Lean Kitting
Kitting process can be made effective by following
Lean principles of reducing wastes in the existing
system [16- 18]. Some of the action items have been:
a) Reduce kitting cycle time
b) Reduce kitting man power
c) Reduce number of partial material packages
returned to stores
Elimination of the causes of kitting errors has been
caused by the following criteria:
a) Insufficient quantity of kanban
Fig. 14 Three zoned warehouse rack section
b) Excessive quantity of parts
c) Wrong parts Gold Zone: The opening gold zones were easily
d) Incomplete kits reachable parts by using order pickers and also hand
e) Insufficient quantity of packages reachable. When pick tags were generated with station
wise zoning, the tags get bundled and kitting operator
Warehouse Zoning Solution finds it easy to pick all parts at this reachable level.
Thus, reducing the kitting time.
To reduce the picking time for the kitting
member, zone wise arrangements of parts were planned Silver Zone: The opening silver zones were just above
in warehouse. Racks configurations were designed to the gold zone where the medium fast moving parts were
support FIFO for all the parts. placed. These parts were replenished either in pallets or
as-is-condition from supplier with quantity more than
In earlier condition, whenever kitting operator
one. Order pickers or reach trucks were used to pick the
gets the list to pick the parts, operator used to run
parts.
around the whole rack sections. In what follows,
searching parts used to consume most of the time. Bronze Zone: The opening bronze zones were at the
Moreover, parts have been arranged in alphabetical top level of the racks in which slow moving parts were
order for easy identification. But, operator has been placed. The frequencies of picking these parts were very
using order picker and reach truck to pick even fast low. Reach trucks were used to pick the parts in this
moving parts. Since, this process consumes more time, zone.
it warranted immediate attention. Parts in the rack bins
were named as Add to existing stock whenever parts This activity resulted in reduction of cycle
were not picked in FIFO way. More than that, all time by 45% and reduced MHE movements. Further,
manual process was followed with no tracking in place. manpower will be reduced once the process gets
To improve this, a new process was adopted known as stabilised.
zoning of warehouse parts. This approach was divided Warehouse Lean Assessment Summary:
into two ways, one to address productivity and second
one for quality as reported in Figure 13. System driven put away location
100% FIFO for all parts, including floor locations
Kanban with barcode scanning followed for D class
parts in each station

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 Bar coded pick and put away tags
Separate storage types to identify the parts that
require painting with the system based provision to
move the parts back after painting
Visibility of inventory and Work-in-Progress
Simulation Analysis Result:
Simulation analysis was conducted to validate the
developed solution for the following parameters using
DES. Aisle Congestion analysis was been depicted in
Figure 15 and Figure 16 respectively. MHE utilisation
summary and cycle time validation for reduced
inventory at line side was documented in Figure 17 and
Figure 18.

Fig. 15 2012 Aisle traffic

Fig. 16 2015 Aisle traffic

Fig. 18 MHE utilisation summary

Also, parameters like reduced inventory at
line side, MHE breakdown effect were analysed using
simulation tool and observed good results. This
recommendation was implemented from the developed
solution. Due to confidentiality issues with the
company, simulation analysis report has not been
reported in this paper.

4. RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS

The project was carried out with an objective
of reducing the identified MUDA in material feeding
system by implementing the best practices using Lean
concepts. To accommodate the growth in volume due to
Fig. 17 MHE utilisation summary market demand, the bottleneck was identified to be
meeting system, which hindered the assembly line
expansion. Instead of adding new process and resource
to achieve the desired takt time, company encouraged
the right approach of clearing bottlenecks in the system
to utilise the existing resources and line set up to its full
capacity. The engine line after implementation of kitting

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has been shown in Figure 19. Also, UF03 station after Line side inventory level: 54.3% against the target
kitting implementation has been depicted in Figure 20. of 50%
In parallel, Value Stream Mapping (VSM) [19] after
solution implementation has been reported in Figure 22.

Fig. 19 Engine line after implementation of kitting

Fig. 22 VSM after complete solution implementation

Conclusions:
The solution developed has been validated
after implementing for 30 days through pilot study for
evaluating kitting process accuracy. The result has been
Zero POU miss and 100% accuracy in pick and put
away process during the month of January 2013. The
output has been validated by steering committee, which
comprised of Manufacturing, Industrial Engineering,
Supply Chain Management (SCM), Plant Manager and
Fig. 20 UF03 station after kitting implementation Industrial Guide. Standard work sheets has been
developed for standardising the process and
Finally, this solution was implemented in all
documented. Further, record accuracy management
assembly and sub assembly stations and observed an
team validated the material flow and storage accuracy,
improvement by 85% in all workstations. Nevertheless,
which yielded positive result.
in some stations, due to pending management decision
and big and pallet parts handling, kitting process did not Based on the study, following conclusions can be
show much benefit. In summary, the attained result has drawn:
been compared with target results as shown in Figure
21. The study carried out in this paper recommends a
lean way of material feeding system to support
assembly line in order to achieve desired volume of
four machines per day
Following output were observed against the target
planned when kitting was implemented:
Line side replenishment: 29.6% against the
target of 20%
Line side storage space: 68.3% against the
target of 70%
Operator walk time: 78.4% against the target
of 75%
Fig. 21 Result target vs. achieved Line side inventory level: 54.3% against the
Consolidated results after kitting implementation target of 50%
have been collated as follows:
To support Lean kitting, MUDA should be
Line side replenishment: 29.6% against the target of addressed from warehouse, starting from inbound
20% till outbound. Zoning concept proved to be a good
Line side storage space: 68.3% against the target of solution to address such issues and improve kitting
70% process
Operator walk time: 78.4% against the target of
75%

SAS TECH Journal 33 Volume 12, Issue 2, September 2013

5. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FUTURE [11] Johansson B., Johansson M.I., High automated
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