Analysis and Management of

Production System
Lesson 02: Operative structure and product tree

Prof. Giulia Bruno

Department of Management and

Production Engineering

giulia.bruno@polito.it
Operative Structure

The analysis the OS of a production process develops in three phases

● 1° PHASE = PRODUCT ANALYSIS: is based on the customer needs, which give

the specifications of the desired product, and aims at developing a model of a
product, called product tree, specifying, for every component of the product and
for the final product, which group of simpler components is needed to build it, and
which operation is necessary for this purpose

● 2° PHASE = PROCESS ANALYSIS: recognize, from the product tree, a model of

the working and assembly process called working sequence, i.e. the sequence
of production operations to be performed, and the map of resources, which is
then used to describe the layout

● 3° PHASE = LAYOUT ANALYSIS: evaluate the utilization of the production plant,

which means analyzing the layout to estimate the production volumes (number
of final products per unit time) and the production flows (frequency of
completing final products)
Operative Structure
Scheme of the three phases of the analysis of the operative structure
Product tree

A generalized representation of a product is given by a tree, i.e., an

oriented graph G = (V, L), where V is the set of the vertices of the
graph and L is the set of the edges.

The basic characteristics of a Product Tree are the following:

➔ A product tree has one root node, representing the final product,
and a number of leaves (initial nodes), representing the raw
materials or the basic components purchased from suppliers
➔ Each internal node is a product component, produced by the
production system
➔ Each edge is an elementary operation, which is applied to a
component in order to produce a more complex component
Example
Example

Considering the Product Tree, it is possible to recognize the sequence of

Production Operation necessary to manufacture the Abajour
● 1st Prod. Operation Turning = Elementary Operation ➔ (a) Turning the
base; (b) Turning the wood rod
● 2nd - Prod. Operation Assembling = Group of Elementary Operations ➔
assembling the lamp post
● 3rd - Prod. Operation Assembling = Group of Elementary Operations ➔
assembling the electric circuit
● 4th - Prod. Operation Assembling = Group of Elementary Operations ➔
assembling the abajour without the electric circuit
● 5th - Prod. Operation Assembling = Group of Elementary Operations ➔
assembling the final product

This is a practical description: we need to translate this practical

description into a formal model
Map of operations

A formal representation of a product tree it’s given by the Map of

Operations that’s the incidence matrix of the graph that represent the
product

Denoting with i and j two components of the product, and with MOij/p, the
relation between them, the incidence matrix is described by

MOij/p  such that element (i,j) = 1 if exist a link from i to j

= 0, otherwise.
Example

Product tree Map of operations

PF = final product
CA; CB; CC = components
TO
A; B; C = raw materials FROM
PF CA CB CC A B C level
PF 0
PF CA 1 1
MOp= CB 1 1
CC 1 1 1,2
CA CB CC
A 1 2
B 1 2,3
C 1 2,3
CC A B C

B C
Graph model

Corresponding graph model to the incidence matric of the map of operations

A
PF CA CB CC A B C CA

PF
CA 1 B

PF
CB 1 CC

CC 1 1
C
A 1
B 1
CB
C 1

A product tree is defined as a graph in which there is a single component without

exiting edges (= the final product PF), as well as a set of components without
entering edges (= the raw materials)
Observations

Given a component j, the set of components

needed to produce it are given by the not null
elements of the column MOj/p in the Map of PF CA CB CC A B C
Operations PF
CA 1
Given a component i, the set of components CB 1
which require i for the production are given by CC 1 1
the not null elements of the row MOi/p in the
A 1
Map of Operations
B 1
C 1
From the map of operations it is possible to
obtain the necessary informations to define
the work schedule (i.e., the sequence of
operations to realise the product)
Observations

The list of production operations to produce the

final product is given by the column with not null PF CA CB CC A B C
elements in the Map of Operations PF
CA 1
CB 1
● PO3 - Column PF: Final assembly
CC 1 1
● PO2 - Column CA: Subassembly component CA A 1
● PO1 - Column CC: Subassembly component CC B 1
C 1
PO2
A
CA
PO3
PO1
B

PF
CC

CB
Bill Of Material

Alternative representation of the product tree

Example

Represent “Barbeque” product as a product tree

Example

Represent “Barbeque” product as Map of Operations and list the

Product Operations

Column Description New code

PF Final assembly PO6
PA Plate bearing assembly PO5
GV Side panel painting PO4
GC Leg painting PO3
SF Sheet cutting PO2
G Steel bar cutting PO1
Example

Represent “Barbeque” product as Product graph

Example

Product graph with production operations

PO1 PO4

PO5
PO6

PO2 PO3
Exercise

Represent the Shelf as product tree, map of operations and product

graph

B0IS003 (0.25)