Four Tips to Increase Capacity on Your Production Line
The modern production line requires diligent planning and oversight to function at full capacity. Any inefficiency at any stage in the line will cause delays on further functions – leading to logjams and backlogs that production line managers are all too aware of. In this article, and in light of the many delays that can and do take place on production lines each day, we’ll walk you through four tips to help you increase your production line’s capacity without also increasing its inefficiency.
Audit
When you start thinking about making changes to your production line, you need to make those changes in a planned and phased manner. You need to be aware of where you’re making the changes, why you’re targeting that phase of your production line, and what the knock-on effects of that change might be. You can do this by conducting an audit of your facility, to give you an impression of how your changes will improve our overall capacity. Make sure you go through this stage if you’re interested in boosting your overall production line’s performance.
Hardware
Next up is the hardware that you use on your production line. All modern production lines are slick operations, governed by the technology that was available at the time of their construction. Naturally, technology moves on, and the relics of the past that sit in your production line are likely to have been improved upon in more recent years. That’s the case with Fluent Conveyors, which ferry your products along your line, as well as highly dexterous robotic machines, which you can have tailor-made for your line from several production robotics companies. Look always to your hardware, and to the new technologies on the market, to improve capacity on your line.
Software
While some automation has been running on production lines for decades, the level of control that you can now operate over each element of your production line has increased dramatically. In today’s world of manufacturing and production, it’s easy to monitor and change your production line from a responsive piece of software. This software – much of which may be updated and upgraded from the software that you currently operate – is excellent at spotting where your production line’s weak spots are. As such, this is a significant upgrade to help you boost your production line in the long run.
Workers
How can workers improve your production line? Well, the more experienced your workers, the better able they are to spot issues with your line as they develop. It’s therefore essential that you’re able to keep these most experienced workers at your facility – by increasing their wages and offering them promotions. Meanwhile, bringing in expert software engineers, or hardware designers, can help you slowly work on the next upgrade on your facility – whether that’s in terms of further automation, or a better, faster machine at a specific phase of your production line. Staff will help you make your line far more efficient, increasing capacity.
Bear these four tips in mind to increase the capacity of your production line this year.
