Industrial Engineering

Articles on Industrial Engineering 1. Industrial Engineer's Job Profile It was just a couple of years back that demand of an industrial engineer has increased many times. Reason, an Industrial engineer can do a lot to improve performance of the company. 2. How to Calculate SAM of a Garment? SAM or Standard Allowed Minute is used to measure task or work content of a garment. This term is widely used by industrial engineers and production people in the garment manufacturing industry. For the estimation of cost of making a garment SAM value plays a very important role. 3. Standard minutes (SAM) for basic garments Can anybody estimate SAM (standard allowed minute) of a garment without seeing and/or analyzing the garment? No. It is not possible. To estimate SAM you have to analyze the garment carefully and check different factors that affect the SAM. 4. Garment production systems In simple a garment production system is a way how fabric is being converted into garment in a manufacturing system. Production systems are named according to the various factors, like- Number of machine are used to make a garment, Machines layout, Total number of operators or tailors involved to sew a complete garment and Number of pieces moving in a line during making a garment. 5. How to set production target of a line? It is a very important question, because it is the basic knowledge about production management and each people who are working in production must know how estimated production is calculated. 6. How to balance a traditional sewing line? A sequence of operations is involved in making a garment. In bulk garment production, generally a team works in an assembly line (Progressive Bundle system) and each operator do one operation and give it other operator to do next operation. In this way garment reached to end of the line as a completed garment. 7. How to calculate Garment Cost In the clothing manufacturing, supplier gives final manufacturing cost to buyer prior to order confirmation. For that factory prepares cost sheet estimating costs in different cost heads. Cost heads like Fabric, Trims and Packing materials, Labor cost and Overheads. 8. Different Types of Incentive systems In manufacturing industries, an incentive is a factor (financial or non-financial) that enables or motivates a particular course of action, or counts as a reason for preferring one choice to the alternatives. Eventually, incentives' aim is providing value for money and contributing to organizational success. 9. The Concept of Performance Rating Rating is a subjective comparison of any condition or activity to a benchmark, based upon our experience. While the mechanics of time study record the time a task did take, applying a rating will determine the time a task should take. 10. Process flow chart of a Crew Neck T-Shirt It is always easier to understand a picture than just description. How to make a T-shirt can be explained many times but students learnt it completely when they see it in the production floor. A process flow chart gives them the logic how operations follow sequence one after another. 11. Which production system is better- A conventional line or a Modular line? As I have explained earlier in the article Garment Production Systems that each production system has benefits over others depending on order size, product type, technology level and skill level of the operators. When it comes lean manufacturing system in apparel making, factories start implementing modular system whatever product they might produce. 12. Comparison between Progressive bundle system and UPS system In the industrial sewing plants various types of sewing systems are installed. A plant owner chooses these systems depending on the production volume, product categories, and cost effectiveness of high tech machineries. Among those Progressive Bundle System (PBS) is mostly installed sewing system till date. 13. Work aids and equipment for garment export industry To facilitate worker in doing their jobs most efficiently number of readymade and customized work aids and equipment are being used in the garment industry. Especially work aids are designed for material handling, folding etc. 14. Machinery used for garment sewing in mass production Most of the clothes we wear are sewn by sewing machines. There are several types of sewing machines used to make our clothes. When garment making was industrialized, scientists developed industrial power driven sewing machines to meet the needs of mass production.

15. How to Control Apparel Production Cost? I was in a meeting discussing about line efficiency, present cost per pieces and what the production people can achieve to lower down the making cost. When we started discussing the fact and figures everybody was surprised. 16. How to calculate Machine requirement for garment to be made in an assembly line? Follow the following steps to estimate how many machines and what types of machines you need to make your garment in an assembly line. The primary information you need to calculate number of machines 17. Which Machines are needed to make Basic Polo Shirts? Five types of machines are used in making basic Polo Shirt . Machines are Lock stitch (Single Needle), Over edge (Over lock), Button holing, Button attaching and Flat lock (Flat bed). 18. Which Machines are needed to make Basic Tee Shirts? Three types of machines are generally used for making Basic Tee (Crew Neck) in mass production. Machines are Lock stitch (Single Needle), Over edge (Over lock) and Flat lock (Flat bed or Cylinder bed). 19. How to reduce line setting time? Engineers and production managers always look for a way to improve factorys labor productivity. But they look over things that lower labor productivity. 20. What is on-standard efficiency and off-standard efficiency? When operators are not working on-standard jobs they are simply not producing any garments or any minutes. That is why to know operators actual performance on the on-standard jobs; operators efficiency is presented as on-standard efficiency. 21. How to calculate operator efficiency at work? In apparel manufacturing, skills and expertise of a sewing operator is being presented in Efficiency term. An operator with higher efficiency produces more garments than an operator with lower efficiency in the same time frame. When operators work with higher efficiency, manufacturing cost of the factory goes down. 22. How to calculate efficiency of a production batch or line? Like individual operator efficiency, efficiency of a production line or batch or section is important for a factory. Daily line efficiency shows the line performance. To calculate efficiency of a line for a day, you will need following data (information) from the line supervisor or line recorder 23. Operation Break-down and SAM of the Full Sleeve Men's Formal Shirt? Prior to defining SAM of the garment, detailed operation break-down is made by engineer. Both manual and machine operations are included in the operation list. Then a skilled operator is given to do operations one by one. 5 to 10 samples are studied. All operations are studied by GSD expert for motion analysis 24. Engineers, Be careful with data what you presenting to your boss Business owners normally seek for data about the performance of the factory from engineers. The primary KPIs are line efficiency, machine productivity of the current running orders, production capacity production cost etc 25. Can anybody hit 100% Efficiency of GSD SAM? I have intentionally referred GSD SAM because most of garment engineers, industry experts and business owners believe that GSD based standard minutes are more accurate than other. You may feel that what a silly question it is. But I met numbers of young industrial engineers, who ask me questions in the same way I have titled this article. 26. How to Find Actual RPM of the machines running on the floor? Though sewing machine manufacturers define machine rpm (maximum level) in the machine label and manual, in the floor machines are not being operated at maximum speed by the operator. Sewing operator runs a machine at lower a speed than specified maximum speed limit. 27. What is Pitch Time, Pitch Diagram and how to make a Pitch Diagram? Pitch time: In industrial Engineering, Pitch time is a ratio of total SAM of garment and number of operations to be set for the style 28. How to grade sewing operators? Generally workers are categorized as skilled, Semi-skilled and unskilled for deciding wages for them. Others grade operators as A, B or C according their experience and expertise on the job. If grading of the operators is done scientifically it will help in selection of operators during line setting of a new style. 29. What is Productivity? Productivity is a measure of the efficiency and effectiveness to which organizational resources (inputs) are utilized for the creation of products and/or services (outputs). Productivity measurement is both a measure of input utilization and an assessment as to whether or not input utilization is growing faster than output 30. How to measure labor productivity? Within a factory, industrial engineers or factory managers and line supervisors measure the number of garments produced by a line of sewing machine operators in a specific time frame. Generally factory works 10 to 12 hours a day. Total production (output pieces) of a line and total labor involved in producing those pieces is required to calculate labor productivity 31. How to calculate thread consumption? There is a standard formula for determining thread consumption. In the available formula you will get

multiplying factors according to machine type and stitching classes. To define thread consumption you just have to multiply seam length with factors. 32. How to do Time study? Three types of machines are generally used for making Basic Tee (Crew Neck) in mass production. Machines are Lock stitch (Single Needle), Over edge (Over lock) and Flat lock (Flat bed or Cylinder bed). 33. How to do Method Study? Method study is more of a systematic approach to job design than a set of techniques. It is defined as the systematic recording and critical examination of existing and proposed methods of doing work, as a means of developing and applying easier and more effective methods and reducing costs 35. What is work Sampling. Work sampling is a method of finding the percentage occurrence of a certain activity by statistical sampling and random observations 36. How to calculate machine SPI The abbreviation of SPI is Stitches per inch. In the Metric System it is expressed as Stitch per centimeter (SPC). It is very easy to measure SPI of the machine or seam. To measure it, take a fabric swatch of 12 inch X 2 inch. 37. Use of Takt time in apparel industry? Takt time is the allowable times to produce one product at the rate of customers demand. This is NOT the same as cycle time, which is the normal time to complete an operation on a product (which should be less than or equal to TAKT time). 38. How to Estimate Sewing Time by Machine RPM? Are you confused how to estimate that how much time should be taken by a sewing operator to sew a specific length of seam? Read this article to know how to estimate it. 39. Secret behind calculation of machine time in SAM? Standard allowed minute (SAM) of an operation is the sum of 3 different parameter, i.e. machine time, material handling (with personal allowances) time and bundle time. Material handling and bundle time is calculated by motion analysis. 40. 7 Ways to Reduce to WIP from Bottleneck Operations A bottleneck operation determines hourly production of a sewing line. In a bottleneck operation garments are piled up compared to other operations in the line and produces lowest number of garments. Efficiency of the line as well as labor productivity is affected by work in process (WIP) level at bottleneck operations. 41. Operation Breakdown and SMV of Garment The operation breakdown of a trouser with two front pocket and two back pocket has been given in the following table. SMVs mentioned here against each operation are just for your reference. It may vary according to machine types, workstation layout and equipment used. 43. 20 Ways to improve productivity in garment production Higher productivity brings higher margin in a business. And increment in Productivity level reduces garment manufacturing cost. Hence factory can make more profit through productivity improvement. 44. What is Skill Matrix for Sewing operators? Skill Matrix is a chart or a database where operators past performances on various operations are recorded in a systematic way for the future reference. In a skill matrix operator performance is recorded in efficiency percentage. 45. Garment Production Cost: Actual cost Vs Cost per SAMOne of the most important KPIs for garment manufacturing is comparison between Actual costs Vs Cost per SAM. Factories calculate these costs and compare on daily basis. The actual cost figure shows that how much money factory is paying as make up to the operators. But exactly how these measures are calculated? 46. How to do Line Balancing using Operator Skill History? The prerequisite of this method is to have a skill matrix of sewing operators. Normally, at the time of line setting, operators are selected based on their experience on operations. The calculated skill level of the operators on the operations is not considered at all. 47. Operations, Seams and Sewing Machines Database for Basic Products now on the Web I always feel that I should have knowledge about all sewing machines need to make garments covering all products. But it is not easy to keep in mind when I am not sewing machines supplier or distributor and even I am not making all types of garment in my factory. 48. KPIs for Garment Manufacturers Key performance Indicators (KPIs) are measured to assess where the factory currently stands and to find key focus areas where management needs to look into. Top 9 KPIs has been listed and explained below that are measured by garment manufacturers (export houses) in the apparel industry.

Production Planning & Control

1. What is Line Planning? Line means sewing production line or production batch. Each line contains a set of machines to make garments for mass production and set of machines vary depending on product category. 2. How to Calculate Production Capacity of a Factory? In Apparel Manufacturing, Production capacity is one of the most important criteria used for vendor selection by the buyers. It is because; the production time of an order is directly proportional to vendors production capacity. So it is very important that marketing and planning personnel should aware about the production capacity of their production units. 3. Functions of Production Planning and Control (PPC) Department in Apparel Manufacturing Production planning and Control department is one of the important departments for an apparel manufacturing company. In the context of the apparel manufacturing primary roles of the Production Planning and Control (PPC) department has been listed below. Each functions has been explained briefly just overview about the task. To know details about the task read related articles. 4. How many days factory needs to make 5,000 Polo Shirts? To find the answer of the above question you must have following information - SAM of the Polo Shirt (i.e. 16 minutes) - How many machines will be used to make the order (i.e. 20 machines). 5. 3 Ways to increase your Garment Production Production is defined as output quantity derived from utilization of machine and manpower effort in a specified given time. 6. Production Planning Software for Garment Manufacturing - An overview With the time and technology advancement garment manufacturers are becoming dependent on customized ERPs and other IT based management tools. Production planning and control tools for the factory level management are very essential to manage production to deliver shipment on time. 7. The Current Reality of Production Planning and Control Department in the Apparel Industry Production Planning and Control (PPC) department is one of the most important departments of the manufacturing organisations. What I have seen during my visit to factories that many of them do not have PPC department. Instead of it, I think there might be someone appointed for the planning work with a different profile name. 8. Reasons that fail production plan and cause shipment delay Production Planning and Control (PPC) department is one of the most important departments of the manufacturing organisations. What I have seen during my visit to factories that many of them do not have PPC department. Instead of it, I think there might be someone appointed for the planning work with a different profile name. 9. Formula for calculating Sewing Room Capacity The formula used for calculating available capacity of the sewing line has been given below. The available capacity of a line is presented in minutes or hours. 10. How to make line loading plan for garment production In Line loading plan planner decides on which date a style to be loaded and how many lines to be considered for the style to meet the production completion date. Line loading plan is an important task for a production planner.