Congratulations to the Letterkenny Army Depot for winning its second Shingo Prize for lean excellence.
“David Gress, the division chief for the Ground Support Division, said each step of production is limited to 30 minutes. Depot Chief of Staff Mark Sheffield said the result has been lowering the man-hours it takes to rebuild a vehicle from 274 man-hours in January 2005 to 174 now.
The efficiencies have been realized by “observing the process. Taking the waste out of it,” Korby said. One example, he said, is determining whether repairing or replacing a part is going to save the most time and money.”
So the time is limited to 30 minutes. We can assume that is somewhat faster than the takt time (or demand) for Humvee refurbishing. Demand is 275 per month. Assuming 5 days a week, 8 hours a day, and an 85% utilization rate (we're accounting for breaks, etc.), let's say there are roughly 9180 minutes available per month. 9180/275 = a takt time of 33.3 minutes.
Unlike building a Humvee, which would have very consistent and deterministic labor content, I'm sure it's challenging to predict exactly how much work is required to refurbish a set of Humvess?
It's great to see the Army talk about observing the process and eliminating waste. It also sounds like they have done a good job of matching their cycle times to takt times.
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