12/13/2019 How to identify bottlenecks in a packaging production line

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How to identify bottlenecks in a packaging

production line
Dec 05, 2019

Imagine a production line in which only good parts are produced (100% quality), as fast as possible (100% performanc
and without stops (100% availability). The Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) would equal 100%, which means “pe
production”. Even though dreams can come true (100% OEE), perfect production is rather rare, and in many cases th
manufacturing shop- oor can become, for those directly involved in production, a nightmare instead. Machines fail f
several reasons, humans make mistakes and all of this together makes it impossible to achieve perfection. 

The good news is that there is always room for improvement, i.e. we can always do things better. Aiming at that, a
continuous improvement process should be put in place to tackle exactly what prevents a production line from bein
perfect. In the “Theory of Constraints”, Eliyahu M. Goldratt, author of the best-selling book titled “The Goal”, argues th
one should follow “The Five Steps of Focusing” to achieve the goal (e.g. maximize overall throughput):

1. Identify the system's constraint(s);

2. Decide how to exploit the system's constraint(s);
3. Subordinate everything else to the above decision(s);
4. Alleviate the system's constraint(s);
5. If in the previous steps a constraint has been broken, go back to step one (i.e. repeat as needed).

The above mentioned theory states that “the throughput of any system is determined by one constraint”. Let's thus
from the beginning and focus on how to identify this constraint, or in other words “the bottleneck”.

Start from the beginning

Consider a production line as illustrated in Fig. 1. It consists of four machines and three buffers or accumulators ( nite
buffers, i.e. they can store only a nite amount of parts). Discrete parts ow from M1 to M4 and visit all machines and ×
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machine. The net production for a

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12/13/2019 How to identify bottlenecks in a packaging production line
speci c period of time equals the amount of parts entering the rst machine (gross production) minus the sum of sc
produced in the line. 

This type of production line depicted in Fig. 1 is known as “asynchronous system”. The machines are, to a certain exte
decoupled from each other due to intermediate buffers. Thus, each machine can start and stop independently
(asynchrony), even if they have exactly the same cycle time, provided that the neighbor buffers are neither empty no
Since the machines are not totally decoupled from each other, they can be blocked or starved. A machine is blocked
is operational but the downstream buffer is full, that means no more parts can be stored on it and the machine is for
to stop (idle). 

On the other hand, a machine is starved, if it is operational but the upstream buffer is empty, i.e. there is no parts ava
to be processed and the machine stops (idle). To illustrate this dynamic, Fig. 2 presents a simpli ed example of a mac
status, let’s assume it is M2 from Fig. 1, and the storage level of its neighbor buffers in a timeline containing six “time-
steps” enumerated from 0 to 6. At time-step 0, M2 is active and the buffers are neither empty not full. After a while th
storage level of B1-2 starts decreasing, probably because M1 stopped due to a failure, until it is completely empty at ti
step 1 .

At this moment M2 is starved and stops processing parts. At time-step 2, M2 starts processing parts again. A while af
B2-3 begins to ll up, probably because M3 or M4 stopped due to a failure, and gets completely full at time-step 3, w
M2 is blocked. From time-step 4, M2 is active again until it stops at time-step 5. At this moment M2 is neither starved
blocked, and thus it is in a failure-mode. B1-2 lls up and B2-3 empties. Fig. 2 thus illustrates a common dynamic that
to be followed to evaluate the status of every single machine in a production line.

[You might like this: How a packaging manufacturer increased $144k in factory capacity?]

Machine-status possibilities
In terms of availability, the following four machine-status are possible (three of them are illustrated in Fig. 2):

1. Active: the machine is up and processing parts;

2. Idle: the machine is either blocked or starved;
3. Failure: the machine is down due to a failure;
4. Stopped: the machine is down due to a planned activity, such as setups, planned maintenance, among others.

These four status set the basis and are crucial for identifying the bottleneck, but still some more information is requir

The reason for that is because an active machine can produce scrap and/or have longer cycle time when
compared to other machines. Thus, availability, quality and productivity aspects have to be considered.

One possible solution is to adapt the OEE calculation. Instead of having an OEE for the entire production line, one ha
adapt the calculation for every single machine. Let's call it OEEbd, which stands for “OEE bottleneck-detection”. OEE
differs from the usual OEE, because it does not consider idle-time as part of the available-time. Why not? The reason
that is because when a machine is idle, it is in this condition because it is restricted by another machine. Thus, only a
time and failure-time is considered as available time and is used to calculate OEEbd. At the end, the machine with th
lowest OEEbd score at any given time instance is considered the bottleneck at that moment. It is important to ment
this time-dependency, since bottlenecks can also shift from one machine to another due to different reasons. 
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Let’s check a simpli ed practical example, based on the production line depicted in
you continue browsing by selecting any item on the website, you consent to the use of cookies. Fig.1. We assume it is a packagin
line, producing plastic tubes, at a maximal production rate of 250 tubes per minute. All machines have the same
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12/13/2019 How to identify bottlenecks in a packaging production line
maximum speed, or in other words the same cycle-time. Data for thirty days of production is summarized in Table 1.
rst ve rows show the accumulated amount of days where each machine was active, blocked, starved, stopped or in
failure-mode. 

The gross production for the thirty days is 7 million tubes, that is the number of tubes that entered M1 (or were extru
Net production and the correspondent scrap rates are also presented in Table 1. The available time required to calcul
OEEbd, as mentioned before, is the sum of active time and failure time. The ideal production is calculated based on t
available time and would be the “perfect production” for this speci c aggregated time. Since production rate is 250 t
per minute (360,000 tubes per day), M1, for example, would have an ideal production of 8,280,000 tubes (23days
multiplied by 360,000). Since M1 produced only 6,850,000 tubes, it's OEEbd score is 82,7% (6,850,000 divided by
8,280,000). After repeating the same for all machines, one can see that M2 has the lowest OEEbd score (80,2%) and
represents the bottleneck for this thirty days of production. Further interesting information can be seen from Table 1

1. Even though M1 and M2 have the same total failure time (3 days each), M2 has the lowest OEEbd score, since M2
a higher scrap rate;
2. Even though M3 spent one extra day in failure-mode when compared to M4, it has the highest OEEbd. The reas
for that is because M4 has a scrap rate that is more than three times higher than M3’s scrap rate.

You should go a bit deeper: keep checking 

In reality, the task of correctly assigning the different status to all machines is a great challenge. It cannot be solved
through simple observation in fast production lines, as usual in the packaging industry. A big amount of data has to
collected, processed and analysed so that one can get the right insights. Sensores have to be strategically placed alo
the production line to gather all required information and a powerful algorithm has to run behind the scenes to solve
complex and important problem. 

To illustrate this, Fig. 3 shows data from a real production line, in which only two machines are depicted for a 24-hour
production. Production rate is 160 tubes per minute and one can see that both machines stop several times (micro-s
and long stops). Most of the time M1 restricts M2, so M2 starves because B1-2 gets empty. At around time 1,000 minut
for example, M1 reduces production speed to 130 tubes per minute, causing M2 to have several micro-stops (B1-2 cou
not keep feeding enough parts to M2). Even though Fig. 3 can look relatively clear, adding more data, i.e. another few
machines, accumulators, etc, would make complexity increase exponentially. 

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12/13/2019 How to identify bottlenecks in a packaging production line

And what to do to overcome an identi ed bottleneck?

Now that the bottleneck has been detected in the previous example (Table 1), one should decide how to exploit it aim
at alleviating the constraint. The rst hints from the table are “Failure Time” and “Scrap Rate”. 

In the case of Failure Time, a more thorough assessment should be conducted to map the main causes of
failures/downtime (fault diagnosis). Based on it, intermittent mechanical and/or electrical faults can be detected, so t
proper action plan can be set to mitigate their effects and increase the overall “Mean Time Between Failures”. Minim
the “Mean Time to Repair” is also crucial. 

This can be done by reducing the “Maintenance Response Time”, for example, by having automatic alarms notifying
maintenance team about faults. The maintenance team should also follow “Standard Maintenance Procedures” to
guarantee minimal repair times. On top of that, a “Preventive Maintenance Plan” should be created focusing on the m
detected failures. Capacity building and empowerment of operators/workers is another important strategy to run yo
factory more ef ciently. Giving operators real time information about what is going on on the shop oor can help the
make quick decisions and consequently increase the overall ef ciency of the production lines. 

The above mentioned strategies are just a few options to start the “battle”. Reminder: put focus on quick wins to have
immediate bene ts. The main cause of equipment inef ciency is not necessarily the easiest to tackle. Start simple.

In terms of scrap, a very similar approach to what was mentioned above should be followed. Map it rst. It can be a
problem with the raw material, with inadequate adjustment/setup of the machine, with incorrect process parameter
even problems with the automated quality control systems, just to mention a few. So, quick wins rst, and don't forge
keep the operators informed in real time. They are always willing to have the best shift performance of the day/week,
you can help them by providing good quality information..

As the goal of any business is to make more money, a good start towards the goal is to identify the bottlenecks.
Opportunities for improvement exist in every production line. Recognizing this fact and putting efforts to constantly
these opportunities is an important step to create a culture of continuous improvement in your organization.

Do you know where your bottlenecks are?

By Dr. Eduardo Weingärtner

Chief Data Of cer - PackIOT
PhD from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH)

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