Tombro Industries is in the process of automating one of its plants and developing a flexible manufacturing system. The company is finding it necessary to make many changes in operating procedures. Progress has been slow, particularly in trying to develop new performance measures for the factory.

In an effort to evaluate performance and determine where improvements can be made, management has gathered the following data relating to activities over the last four months:

The president has read in industry journals that throughput time, MCE, and delivery cycle time are important measures of performance, but no one is sure how they are computed. You have been asked to assist the company, and you have gathered the following data relating to these measures:

Required:

1          For each month, compute the following performance measures:

(a)        Throughput time.

(b)         MCE.

(c)        Delivery cycle time.

2.         Using the performance measures given in the main body of the problem and the performance measures computed in (1) above, do the following:

(a)        Identify areas where the company seems to be improving.

(b)        Identify areas where the company seems to be deteriorating.

3.          Refer to the inspection time, process time, and so forth, given for month 4.

(a)        Assume that in month 5 the inspection time, process time, and so forth, are the same as for month 4, except that the company is able to completely eliminate the queue time during production using Lean Production. Compute the new throughput time and MCE.

(b)        Assume that in month 6 the inspection time, process time, and so forth, are the same as in month 4, except that the company is able to eliminate both the queue time during production and the inspection time using Lean Production. Compute the new throughput time and MCE.

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Month Quality control measures: 185 124 Number of defects 163 91 Number of warranty claims 46 39 30 27 Number of customer complaints 102 96 79 58 Material control measures: 8 days 7 days 5 days 4 days Purchase order lead time 2% Scrap as a percent of total cost 1% 1% Machine performance measures: Machine downtime as a percentage of availability 3% 4% 4% 6% Use as a percentage of availability 95% 92% 89% 85% Setup time (hours) 10 11 12 Delivery perfomance measures: Throughput time ? Manufacturing cycle efficiency (MCE) Delivery cycle time Percentage of on-time deliveries 96% 95% 92% 89% 2. 2.