IMPLEMENTATION OF A MACHINE BREAKDOWN STRATEGY USING TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT AND STATISTICAL PROCESS CONTROL: A UK PERSPECTIVE

In a modem production environment, two major factors contribute to the success of the business; increasing production capability whilst keeping costs to a minimum. In order to achieve these objectives, it is vital that all the people employed in the business work collectively as a team. As part of the overall strategic plan for the business, controlling machine breakdown has to be a prominent factor in minimising a significant percentage of lost production. It seems logical therefore; that steps should be taken to identify specific problems in machine breakdown and produce viable solutions to them. This paper examines the possibility of introducing a strategy of zero machine downtime within a modem production environment using the concept of Total Quality Management and Statistical Process Control. Machine breakdown data obtained from a range of clothing manufacturing companies has been used for the study. The 'Sew-tech' system has been developed to monitor and evaluate machine breakdown using a sequence of statistical tools. The data has been collated and categorised into two specific groups: Types of machine/operation Amount of downtime per machine From this data, graphical representations have been produced in order to highlight problem areas. They portray the data in a visible form that all members of a production team can see and understand readily. The analysis can be expanded to include: machine breakdown for the week, months or years and determine over these periods which machines give the most trouble; which types of machine cost the most to repair and, conversely, which machines perform best and give the best quality results.