People power
As efficient as these state-of-the-art machines are, they are only as good as the people operating them. For teams and individuals to put their best efforts into their work, they need to feel engaged, confident and valued. When they do, quality rises and productivity soars. These are the people you want to keep. They work harder, complete tasks to the best of their ability, deliver better customer service, question processes and are innovative problem solvers.
In-person field support and professional development courses plays a huge role in delivering the right diffusion of skills to maintain this proactive level of productivity engagement. “When teams feel like you are invested in their development and future, they champion further process improvements. This, in turn, has a lasting and invigorating effect,” reports MGS Technical Director Judson Smythe.
Nothing illustrates this point better than the eyewatering results gained when MGS participated in post-installation training. By optimising the machine set up, the Lancashire firm improved their ‘before training’ dry cycle times on the IntElect by a further 10.1 seconds. Compared to the original 29 second cycle time process, the optimised IntElect after training ran at 12.9 seconds. Resulting in over 761,000 more cycles per year, equating to 168 days of extra production “This on-site training helps even the most astute and skilled operatives to explore the full potential of features like parallel functions and how this supports the mould opening and closing speeds,” affirms Ashlee.
Adding robotics into the mix generates at least another five percent in higher productivity. More, if manufacturers can introduce ghost shifts. To demonstrate the potential untapped after-hours production opportunities, this year’s Interplas showcase premiers a compact, fully-automated, compact IntElect75 ton turnkey cell. “Rather than operate split shifts or keep people in the factory until late at night, this cell illustrates to trade moulders and SMEs how they can confidently harness the benefits of automation when manufacturing standard components. To save costs, moulding firms may introduce ‘ghost’ night shifts to ramp up their manufacturing capacity even more. Equally, day-shift teams benefit from augmented workflow processes,” points out Managing Director Nigel Flowers.
For productivity to be sustained, marginal gains is the best approach. Every incremental improvement boosts productivity that little bit more. Providing polymer manufacturers with greater capacity to take on new customers and more projects. “Even in the most profitable organisations, there’s great potential for improving efficiency and workforce competence. The key is to start with the basics; correct operation and setup times; review manual and automated routines; optimise machine cycle times, etc.,” states Nigel.
In-person field support and professional development courses play a huge role in delivering the right diffusion of skills to maintain productive team members.
Find out more and pick up your copy of the Sumitomo (SHI) Demag Processing Productivity Whitepaper at Interplas, Hall 4, Stand C40 or download it today here: https://uk.sumitomo-shi-demag.eu/make-more-for-less
