The Practitioner's Guide to POLCA

Appendix GExplanation of Formula for Number of POLCA Cards

For readers interested in technical details behind the formula for the number of POLCA cards in a loop, we provide here a mathematical basis for the formula. If you are familiar with queueing theory, the formula is based on estimates of various elements of lead time, followed by application of Little’s Law. (If you are not familiar with this concept, you don’t need to read this section; it is provided for readers who are more mathematically inclined and have some knowledge of queueing theory.)

We will use the A/B POLCA loop example that was presented in Chapter 5 in the section “Calculate the Initial Number of POLCA Cards in Each Loop.” It is important that you review that section ...