Motion and Time Study for Lean Manufacturing

Motion and time study has finally found a home in the modern plant by helping employees to understand the nature and the true costs of work, assist management in reducing unnecessary costs, and balance work cells to make work flow smoother. This how-to motion and time study book provides readers with a resource that describes the techniques and procedures of motion and time study. Practical, detailed advice is given on all aspects of motion and time study including work station design, job analysis, and the techniques of setting time standards.A new chapter places motion and time study in the context of lean manufacturing. This edition also includes a new section on ergonomics and the environmental aspects of the workplace, while continuing the hands-on approach of prior editions.For engineers and plant managers.

Fred E. Meyers is president of Fred Meyers and Associates, an industrial engineering management consulting company. He designs and implements production improvement and motivation systems. Mr. Meyers is a registered professional industrial engineer and a senior member of the Institute of Industrial Engineers. He has 35 years of industrial engineering experience. He has worked for Caterpillar Tractor Co., Boeing's aerospace division, Mattelloy Co., Times Mirror Corp., Ingersoll-Rand's proto tool division, Spaulding's golf club division, and Southern Illinois University-Carbondale, College of Engineering, where he taught for 20 years while starting and operating his consulting business. He was director of applied research and an associate professor.

Mr. Meyers has worked for over 100 companies as a consultant responsible for installing incentive systems, performance control systems, plant layouts, new product startup, and cost estimating systems. He has worked in heavy equipment manufacturing, aerospace, consumer products, appliance manufacturing, lumber, plywood, paper, oil blending and packaging, furniture, tooling, fiberglass, and many other areas. The variety of his assignments has given him the ability to see the wide-ranging uses of motion and time study.

Fred E. Meyers has taught motion and time study to over 130 classes and 5,000 people, including professional engineers and managers, union stewards, and college students. He has presented seminars to the National Association of Industrial Technology, industrial plants, the U.S. Air Force and Navy, and labor unions.

James R. Stewart is Associate Professor of Technology at Northern Illinois University. For the past decade, he has taught plant layout, engineering economy, manufacturing philosophy, production and inventory systems, industrial quality control, ergonomics, and work measurement and improvement. He is a Fellow in the World Academy of Productivity Science. He is a senior member of the Institute of Industrial Engineers and is a founding member and is on the board of directors of the Society for Work Science. He is also on the board of The International MODAPTS Association. He is an active member of a number of other societies, including NAIT, ASQ, and Human Factors and Ergonomics Society. He has 30 years of experience in work measurement in education, government, and industry.

Dr. Stewart has served on the faculty of several universities; worked in city, county and state productivity programs; and has managed engineering programs in electronics assembly, electronics component fabrication, pulp and paper fabrication, fiberglass processing, industrial tape manufacturing, and engineering consulting. He has published many articles about unique applications of work measurement. James R. Stewart has taught motion and time study in credit and noncredit courses for over 25 years. He has been certified and taught a number of predetermined time systems, including MOST, Work Factor, MTM-1, and MODAPTS.

With the publication of the third edition, a new author, James R. Stewart, has been added to the team. Certainly this does not represent any change in the unique, down-to-earth teaching method of senior author and scholar Fred Meyers. Having been a user and supporter of this book since it was noted at a NAIT seminar a decade ago, the junior author intends to keep it has a text for the teaching of basic courses in using the tools of motion study and time study. Although the book has undergone a number of changes, it provides a practical education in the basic principles of motion and time study. Over the past decade, lean manufacturing has become the philosophy for manufacturers who want to use the tools for improving operations. We see the concept as so important that a new Chapter 2 has been devoted to it. We describe it as a lean manufacturing environment. As an environment, it nurtures and supports many types of improvement systems and methods. And, it is open to the concepts of various cultures and methodologies. Because it sets the tone for all that follows, the chapter has been placed after the overview chapter and before the history chapter. A number of persons important to work measurement have been added to the history chapter, Chapter 3. These include pioneers Henry Gantt and Harrington Emerson, early text authors, consultants, and educators Ralph Barnes and Marven Mundel, as well as Shigeo Shingo, the early Toyota pioneer of what is becoming the lean manufacturing environment. Although we considered many others, the lessons of the lives of these pioneers provide the guidance to install the lean manufacturing environment and to continue the innovation and improvement of our manufacturing system. Chapter 4 has pulled together the introductory material scattered over several chapters. It now provides a concise but complete summary of what is to follow. Chapter 5 is directed toward teaching process charting and process improvement. Chapter 6 adds the SIMO chart to the other tools of operations analysis. Chapter 7 includes a new section on ergonomics and on the environmental aspects of the workplace. Predetermined Time Standards (PTS) Systems, Chapter 8, includes new descriptions of two commercial systems to the usable system that Fred Meyers designed. Time study has been left as developed in prior editions. Chapter 10 still includes the description of standard data but also has the calculation of line balancing and the concepts of lean manufacturing environment plant balancing. All of the material previously spread through three chapters is consolidated here. In Chapter 11, the principles of work sampling have been augmented by a new auditing procedure and, form. A process for scheduling and measuring work performance supplements the indirect labor types described in Chapter 12. The last four chapters have been kept as written, as have the appendices. References, sample problems, worked examples, tests, and other supplemental materials are published separately in the teacher''s supplement. We hope students and teachers will find that the many changes in this edition add to their ability to learn and use the tools of motion and time study in the lean environment. Acknowledgments For the third edition, we wish to thank Rodha Balamuralikrishna for his figures. We also thank reviewers Kenneth Currie of Tennessee Technological University and Donna C. S. Summers, Ph. D., of the University of Dayton. Fred E. Meyers James R. Stewart Preface to the Second Edition The purpose of this how-to motion and time study book is to provide students and practitioners with a resource that describes the techniques and procedures of motion and time study. This book has appropriately been called a "cookbook." Practical, detailed advice is given on all aspects of motion and time study, including work station design, job analysis, aid the techniques of setting time standards. The mathematics requirement of this textbook is high school algebra. A few simple formulas are included in the standard data chapter. These formulas require the insertion of a variable to calculate the time requirement. Two more complicated formulas are used to show how tables are developed. The practitioner can use the tables to save time. Motion study is accomplished before time standards are set. When a company decides to introduce a new product, a technician is asked to provide a plan to produce, for example, 1,500 units per day. The technician must design work stations for every fabrication, assembly, and packout operation. From the work station drawing, a left-hand/right-hand analysis of the work content is made. A predetermined time standard has been set for every body motion, so the times for every motion required to do the job are added together. This will be the time standard, and it was set before the company had the first part, machine, or operator. Modern management requires constant vigilance of its industrial engineers and technicians to reduce costs, reduce effort, and improve the working environment. Lean manufacturing (the Toyota production system) has a word, muda,which means waste. More specifically, any activity that uses resources but does not add value is muda.Lean thinking is one solution to muda.Lean thinking promotes using less effort by Eliminating useless motions, Combining motions, Changing the sequence of motions to make flow smoother, and Simplifying motions. Lean thinking results in the elimination of reduction of waste. Motion and time study has finally found a home in the modern plant by helping employees to Understand the nature and true costs of work, Assist management in reducing unnecessary costs, and Balance work cells to make work flow more smoothly. Motion and time study has also contributed the concept of time standards, so that important management decisions can be made intelligently. Motion and time study can Reduce and control costs, Improve working conditions and environment, and Motivate employees. Manufacturing plant management needs time standards. Many major decisions would be only a guess without time standards. How would we determine how many machines to buy, how many people to hire, how much to sell the product for; how would we schedule the plant, how would we justify new methods or equipment, how would we ensure a balanced work load on assembly lines, and how would we evaluate employees or pay for increased effort? Chapter 4 answers these questions and inspires an appreciation of the importance of motion and time study. This book will equip engineers and managers with the purposes, attitudes, methods, and techniques of motion and time study to make their plants leaner. Chapters 5 through 8 discuss methods analysis techniques. Stopwatch time study can be accomplished only after the machines have been installed and the operators fully trained. In a proposed new plant, no machines or employees are available to time study, but an operating plant can use stopwatch time study very effectively. The stopwatch technique is the oldest technique of setting time standards and it is entrenched in many companies. Chapter 9 examines this technique. Standard data is another technique of setting time standards before production begins, but it is developed from in-plant experience. Standard data is very personal to a specific company, and companies cannot normally use another''s standard data. This is the most accurate, least costly method of setting time standards, and every motion and time study department should be developing its own. Chapter 10 examines this technique. Work sampling is based on the laws of probability and it is a scientific technique of settin