SMED Kaizen - Rapid Improvement in Just 5 Days!

Single Minute Exchange of Die (SMED) is a lean kaizenminutes and there were approximately 30
event designed to dramatically reduce thechangeovers per 24 hour day. A team of 18 people
changeover times between production runs. It's(coincidently the same number) was divided into
measured as the time from the last good product ofthree groups to attack this problem:a) A TPM (Total
the current production run to the first good productProductive Maintenance) team,b) A SMED team,
of the next run. Two different companies have usedandc) A scheduling team.
this SMED Kaizen to improve their businessOne surprising discovery of the TPM team was that
performance within the last month.OEE (Overall Equipment Effectiveness) on this
One is a molding company, where the changeoverparticular packaging line was only 28.8%. This means
times on a molding machine averaged 8.8 hoursthe line was only producing good product 28.8% of
before the kaizen. A team of 18 people attacked thisthe time it was scheduled. The largest loss of
problem. The team was subdivided into threeeffectiveness was in minor stops and jams,
groups:a) A mold preparation team,b) A qualityaveraging 38%.
assurance team, andc) A scheduling team.The results achieved on this kaizen were:
The results achieved on this kaizen were:1. Improve throughput in packaging by 30%,
1. Reduction of mold preparation time from 8.8 hours2. Reduce the changeover time from 18 minutes to 9
to 4.2 hours,minutes, and
2. Reduction of quality assurance time from 2.8 hours3. Increase OEE from 28.8% to 37%.
to 45 minutes, andAlthough #3 was a modest gain at best, it was
3. Scheduling changes to run products in a moredetermined to conduct a special TPM Kaizen as soon
logical sequence in smaller batch sizes.as possible on this packaging equipment to eventually
The other is a medical devices company, where theachieve 85% OEE, which is world-class.
changeover time on a packaging line averaged 18