Lean Machine Shops and Job Shops
What We Find
Machine shops vary as much as the work they handle. Some machine shops have fairly steady demand products but most are job-shop type environments where lot sizes can run from one piece to hundreds. Most feel Lean doesn’t, or can’t apply to them. However, with rare exceptions they are almost always wrong. We have yet to find a machine shop where no Lean principles could be applied. In a worst-case scenario, one could still apply 5S, total productive maintenance (TPM), setup reduction, visual controls, material flow, and heijunka to most machine-shop environments. Even job shops in most instances can set up cells.
Where to Start? Group-Tech Matrix
In most machine shops, the best place to ...
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