Vijayakumar et al., International Journal of Advanced Engineering Technology E-ISSN 0976-3945
Research Paper
IMPACTS OF LEAN TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES FOR IMPROVING
MANUFACTURING PERFORMANCE IN GARMENT
MANUFACTURING SCENARIO: A CASE STUDY
G. Vijayakumar, Y. Robinson
Address for Correspondence
Department of Mechanical Engineering, RVS Technical Campus – Coimbatore, Tamilnadu, India – 641402
ABSTRACT
The study has been conducted after studying for one year at garment industry in Tirupur. The lot of the garment industry can
maximize their profit by reducing major types of waste by implementation of lean tools and techniques. This research
concentrated the application of lean concepts to the bulk manufacturing sector with a focus on garment firms and several
lean tools & techniques have been applied in the garments. Main theme of this paper has identifications of significant
problems related to lean waste occurs in garments have been measured using specific lean tools and techniques. The research
methodology concentrates the implementation of DMAIC and cause and effective diagram are used for eliminating garment
defectives and 5S Concepts for reducing defects and motion. 5S Concepts was adopted and initiated with appointing of 5S
committee members and trained them by implementation of 5S concepts in garment firms. An initial audit has been
conducted and recorded, after training. At Same time, this paper concluding some suggestion about garments firms for
improving manufacturing performance of the garments by using lean tools and techniques.
KEYWORDS: 5S, DMAIC, Cause and Effective Diagram, Garment industry, Lean waste, Defectives.
1. INTRODUCTION
Implementation of lean manufacturing for most of
the companies is to make profits either directly by
reducing costs or indirectly by maximizing
productivity [1]. One of the most successes of
garment firms in Tiruppur is that they produce
garments with cheap labour cost. This research
makes use of 5s and Pareto analysis, generally in a
garment industries more consideration is given
methodology. According to Tennant and Geoffeliminating “Defective items and improvement of
productivity
by
adaptation
of
continuous
improvement process”. To improve the growth of
garment firms in positive direction it is important to
ensure the proper utilization of each resource of
firms. Importance of using the lean principles to
eliminate non value added wastes in garment
industry[2].Many garment manufacturing firms of
their economic growth mainly depends minimization
of garment waste to achieve maximum benefit by
implementation of lean tools and techniques in
garments firms. In most of the garment firms, lot of
rejected garments occurs after shipment. These
garment defects may occur due to less quality raw
materials or faulty process or employee informal
behavior. A study by Kayaalp I. and Erdogan, M.
show that more than 75% garment defects are found
in the final inspection coming from sewing
section[3].In the modern world of garment
manufacturing, payable to high competitive of the
global market, different firms have initiated to adopt
lean tools and techniques and practices to minimize
the percentage of defects. Pareto Analysis helps to
determine the defects of garments and classify them
according to their importance. Achieving lowest cost
and shortest lead time are essential to compete in the
global garment market [4]. In this research 5s,
DMAIC and Pareto analysis are used as a lean tool to
minimize the lean wastes in garment firms. 5S is one
of the optimum lean tool and techniques for
eliminating the garment wastes which occurs made
by human, increasing productivity and clear visibility
of non conformances at workplace. Under profile
waste matrix, Pareto analysis helps to identify 86%
of garment waste occurs due to human mistakes. It
graphically describes the relationship between a
given outcome and all factors that influence the
outcome and hence to determine the defects of
garments. Waste and productivity of firms are the
Int J AdvEngg Tech/Vol. VII/Issue II/April-June,2016/251-260
two main issues of garment in world wide. In this
connection this research work has been conducted in
garment manufacturing firms. According to literature
review
[3].This
research
concentrates
for
implementation of DMAIC concept only in sewing
section and implementation of 5S concept in all
sections of selected garment industry for elimination
of lean wastes like defects and unnecessary motion
occurs in garments due to identification of different
types of problem related to lean waste.
1.1 Objectives
The main concept in lean manufacturing is to
minimization of lean manufacturing waste. The
objective of this research is to investigate lean wastes
in garments and framed in profile waste matrix and
lean manufacturing tools can be adopted to minimize
the garment defectives and to assess their merits on a
concern application instance. The objective of lean
manufacturing is to helps employer to maximize their
firm’s operational efficiency and become competitive
through the implementation of various lean tools and
techniques in many sectors of the continuous garment
production process.
The goals of the research are
1. To determine types of lean wastes exist in
the selected garment firms.
2. To identify the possible reasons behind
garment waste and the case of rejection of
garments products.
3. To identify the major reasons behind top
most defects of garments manufacturing
firms using Pareto analysis.
4. Based on defective items, diagrams concept
and DMAIC approaches are adopted for
minimization of occurring defects in
garments.
5. To appoint a 5s coordinator in garment
industry.
6. To identify the waste of garment firms.
7. To develop 5s and garment waste matrix.
8. To develop 5S manual with orientation of
eliminating garment wastes.
9. To conduct exposure programme on waste
elimination of garments through 5S.
10. To Implement garment waste elimination
through 5S.
11. To Measure the outcome using lean
manufacturing metrics.
Vijayakumar et al., International Journal of Advanced Engineering Technology E-ISSN 0976-3945
12. To refine the waste elimination through 5S
causes waste which mainly due to man made
approach.
mistakes which is from Pareto analysis. In these
13. Repeat the activity, at regular intervals to
consequences, garment firms are selected for
maintain the improvements of garment
research work for elimination of garment waste by
firms.
implementing 5S lean tool in all departments of
garments and DMAIC Six Sigma methodology. This
1.2 Background of the study
At present the success of the many garments firms
research tried to extract the common scenario of
mainly depends on several factors such as, quality of
Garments sector of Tirupur by depicting the existing
garments, manufacturing cost etc. These factors are
situation of garment firms.
hampered due to various defects occurs in the firms.
1.3 Problems Identified
These defects can be repairable that tends to
The garment products of firms like shirts, pants, Tdefectives of product that leads to elimination. In
shirts etc. some of the garment materials such as
worldwide, most of the garments paining due to their
Executive readymade Shirts, Pants and T-shirts are
rejection of their outputs. Defectives in the garments
inspected for defects since this was the important
industry are often that holds the smooth production
item for the firms as they had more demand and the
and focus defective garment items having a high
profit margin for these values of items are high.
impact on overall industry budget due to garment
Table.1 indicates the total number of shirts and pants
wastes. Minimization of defects is a must in quality
inspected and the number of defectives.
and productivity improvement. Whereas rejection
Table.1 Defects of garment items before implementation of 5S
S.N
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
Garment Items
Executive Readymade
Shirts. Design .1
Design.2
Design.3
Design.4
Design.5
Design.6
Design.7
Executive Readymade
Pants Design.1
Design.2
Design.3
Design.4
Design.5
Design.6
Design.7
Design.8
Design.9
Design.10
Executive Readymade TShirts Design.1
Design.2
Design.3
Design.4
Design.5
Design.6
Design.7
Design.8
Design.9
Design.10
Total
Rate per Total amount loss Manufacturing cycle
piece
due to Defective time per piece (minutes)
items
Inspected
pieces
Defectives
items
1660
117
1200
140,400
180
1550
711
755
950
1206
320
121
81
86
94
192
78
970
869
1370
965
1569
1415
117370
70389
117820
90710
301248
110370
182
185
179
186
174
181
1006
125
1647
205875
240
1100
1305
1850
1200
1305
1800
900
420
730
144
135
140
180
171
201
89
52
90
1700
175
1287
1167
1467
1647
1692
1287
1751
1767
1167
220
185328
157545
205380
296460
289332
258687
155839
91884
105030
38500
247
242
236
249
254
225
279
220
264
120
1425
1530
1632
1522
1336
1836
1213
1465
1400
31977
147
155
162
150
135
176
124
148
144
3612
267
39249
112
122
155
200
427
269
360
200
197
25654
18910
25110
30000
57645
47344
44640
29600
28368
3259033
125
118
115
109
126
116
120
104
4888
2.0 Suitable Lean Tools and Techniques for
selected garment firms
This paper highlighted that the lean is not only tools
and techniques, but it act as a philosophy. It is a 'way
of thinking' and not a mechanism to action these
thoughts. Lean viewed as a philosophy [5]. In this
research work, implementation of lean tools and
techniques to eliminate major garment wastes exist in
the selected firm. Such as: Pareto analysis and Five S
(5S).These tools are described below:
Pareto analysis: In general, the Pareto principle,
applied to quality of garment items, suggests that the
maximum of the quality losses are mal-distributed in
such a way that a “vital few” defects of items always
Int J AdvEngg Tech/Vol. VII/Issue II/April-June,2016/251-260
comprise a high percent of the overall quality losses
[6].
These defects may arise due to low quality garment
materials or casual behavior of employee. In the
global manufacturing, due to competitive nature of
the market, many garment firms have awaked to
implement for different types of lean tools and
techniques to reduce the garment wastes to eliminate
the percentage of defect. Pareto Analysis needs to
find different garment wastes and classify them
according to their significance.
DMAIC concept:
Six Sigma is a business improvement strategy used to
improve profitability, to drive out waste, to reduce
Vijayakumar et al., International Journal of Advanced Engineering Technology E-ISSN 0976-3945
quality costs & improve the effectiveness and
efficiency of all operational processes that meet or
exceed customers’ needs & expectations [8]
Mostly both methods are used for improvising the
existing process scenario. The determination of
potential reasons for specific problem through cause
and effective diagram concept. Adaptation of short
term solution of both Six Sig methodology and cause
and effective diagram concept for long term of
garment industries problems.
Five S (5S): 5S is a fundamental tool to create
continuous improvement process in industries and
represents a transformation in 5 steps of a product,
which is characterized by maximum efficiency at the
micro level and minimum loss. The most significant
factor which is under the implementation and
maintains the compliance is presented for each S
stage [7].The system creates anon stressful
environment where all items are easy to find and
without any deviation from the normal conditions
becomes obvious by visual management methods. At
same time, 5S techniques maintain quality, reduce
the motion and promote a major costs reduction by
eliminating the wastes and provide the best
framework for improvement throughout the industry.
3. Research Methodology
This research focuses abouteight types of lean wastes
of the selected garment firms located at Tiruppur in
India. Lean tools and techniques are used to
minimize wastages of the existing garment scenario
of the selected firms. The information and data
collected were scrutinized and properly arranged so
that further study and analysis could be performed.
Quantitative data were analyzed by using graphs and
tables. Various types of information were given as a
profile-waste matrix. Based on table 1, analysis has
been shown by Pareto Diagram. Based on profile
waste matrix, Pareto analysis helps to identify 82%
of garment waste occurs due to human mistakes.
Through preliminary analysis the most of defective
garment items occurring in cutting, sewing, washing,
packing and finishing section among all sections in
selected garment industry. The collection of data is
analyzed and technique used for problem solving
through DMAIC of Six Sigma methodology and for
achieving productivity excellence. Mostly employee
casual behavior can be reduced by 5S lean tool.
Therefore this research work minimized garment
defectives by implementing 5S.The detail analyses of
following steps are mentioned by the flow diagram in
Fig.1.
Figure 1: Steps involved in the detail analysis
Finally results from the overall analysis for garment
7.9% defective. The research has recognized that how
firms are given and proper guidelines are provided
to minimization of waste can be employed in lean
for continuous improvement (minimization of
manufacturing to enhance the manufacturing
defective and manufacturing lead time, waste
performance of different issues within the whole
minimization) of the garment firms.
business processes of garment industries. This work
adds to an application guideline for the assessment,
4. Findings and Analysis
Collection of data and information was gathered
and reduction of lean wastes in garment industry.
some past record from the cutting, sewing, fabric,
During this phase, after discussions with the
and sample, embroidery, finishing and packing
production manager and line supervisor’s data is
sections of the selected garment firms and through
collected independently. Several lean wastes are
the observation made of the garment manufacturing
determined which affects the production process of
floor. The information as well as data has been
the firms, after visiting the garment firms,
gathered from production supervisors, managers and
According to lean concepts these garment wastes in
chief executives of garments through the
selected firms are discussed as follows:
questionnaire, physical observation, telephonic
1. Overproduction:
contacts and interview. Finally all data has been
Overproduction producing more than that is essential
analyzed by using tables, graphs and some tools such
by the subsequent process. Many numbers of
as Pareto analysis, cause and effective diagram,
production managers and supervisors assumes that a
DMAIC approach and 5S.
garment waste is caused by quality issues and
manufacturing extra items would make certain that
4.1 Findings of wastes in the garments
A total of 23981Shirts, Pants and T- shirts were
the client order is fulfilled. Surplus garment
checked and 1169 pieces were found defective and its
manufacturing items possibly will be sold with cheap
Int J AdvEngg Tech/Vol. VII/Issue II/April-June,2016/251-260
Vijayakumar et al., International Journal of Advanced Engineering Technology E-ISSN 0976-3945
prices at the fiscal year end of the industry to match
the finances for the subsequent year’s inventory [910].In each production line, rejections of items occur
in garment industry. The cost of overproduction for
firms may be different dimension. Hence the
management always fixes the production goal more
than the buyer’s requirement
2. Waiting:
Waiting takes place in firms because of various non
value added activities among production processes
[11]. Practical schedule is to be set for the
minimizing of some percentage of waiting which
occurs in the garment firms. In several garments, the
waiting is prone to take place in various areas like
samples, stores, sewing, cutting, embroidery,
stitching, finishing, and packing sections and
administrative office in garment firms. This includes
waiting for material, information, equipment, tools
etc. A number of delays are because of waiting for
the course, device break period, service time as well
as wait time for the approval. The reason for the
delay in processing is uncertain and the subsequent
machines to be equipped or additional aid to finish
the course. This surplus time allotment for the
employees to do the increases the garment pieces the
overall wait time and delay in the process [12].
Several times it has been found that garment
employees are waiting in sewing sections and other
accessories. This type of waste is also created due to
breakdown of machine and power failure
3. Transportation:
Transportation is defined as dispatch to and from
outside the firm. Transportation of completed
garment items normally made by an appropriate firm
process in most of the garment industries facing
major impact of lean. Every interval in garment
production that causes waiting time has the possible
to allow work in progress to accumulate. Lean
demands that the items be shipped directly from the
vendor to the particular location where it will be
used.
4. Inventory:
Inventory control is one of the major key elements in
garment manufacturing because of its maximum
expense. More research articles suggest that 60% of
wastes occur in garments industry due to inventory.
This inventory reduction not only save cost but also
tolerates the minimum manufacturing lead time. In
most cases, the designed use-cost of the raw material
in firms is 63.4%; though the real use-cost of raw
materials in garment industries is 65.5%. Excess
inventory is called stagnates the surplus items
without clients orders in the store room [12]. The
high interests of labors for bonus amount in increased
garment manufacturing leads to elevated inventory
level. Poor record keeping, miscommunication with
suppliers and clients and irregular management
decisions will result in elevated inventory levels. As
level of inventory increases, the capital cost for
preserving also increases. When items stagnate in
storeroom, additional time is essential to shift the
materials into warehouse and out of warehouse
locations to clients. The raw material of garment
items received from dying section is stored
temporarily cutting section. Damage of materials in
inventory cumulates with inventory level. Because
there is a difference in buyers’ requirement such as
Int J AdvEngg Tech/Vol. VII/Issue II/April-June,2016/251-260
style, size and delivery dates. On the other hand
dying section make more fabrics, which exceeds
maximum capacity of cutting section as a result
surplus fabrics are stored. The processing of fabrics
which are daily requirement of cutting section is not
received by sewing section. Several fabrics after
cutting process are stored as an inventory in the
intermediate space between sewing and cutting
section. Some modification of fabrics is made in
production line and wasting time to rework in
garments. Optimum inventory is necessary to handle
more efficient manufacturing processes and
minimizing production lead times in garment firms. it
is need to ensure that every sewing worker carry out
their task with a smaller amount of human mistakes
5. Excess motion:
Unwanted motion of worker in garment firms will
result in time lag, waste of human effort and
increased cost of the finished garments. Excessive
motions in the manufacturing environment will cause
delays of manufacturing and lot of troubles.
Unnecessary motions mainly for undocumented work
method and poor work flow. The mainly observable
difficult effect in garment industries is the reducing
the operational efficiency because of time loses in
lifting, moving from one place to another place in
garment, indentifying and retrieving [13].
Inconvenient manufacturing area for position of
items of garments inputs also leads to a waste of
energy time and labor force while arranging and
indentifying. If operator has to bend, stretch, pick up
and move to see better. Unnecessary motions refer to
the importance of ergonomics to reduce defects and
quality of garments. No ergonomics principle is
applied in all sections of garment; moreover the
employee does not follow 5S concepts, because of
every operator involved in unneeded motion.
Sometimes employees leave his/her work place
without any reason which is not desirable for any
type of garment process.
6. Defect:
Modification, rejection of garments is the common
scenario in all section of garments. Every day 1:6
pieces of garments are found to be defective in
garments firms are mentioned in table 1.Mostly
defective materials in garments may add
supplementary changes in design, quality and nature
of work. Generally 62 % of the output is counted as
accepted level by quality department in garment
industry and remaining 34 % of the output is counted
as defect items and rejected by the clients [13]. Due
to poor quality of materials and tools, in unnecessary
process, human errors and design errors, defect
occurs. Minimum number of production processes
may attain good quality in each time. Defective items
can cause both indirect and a direct cost occurs in
firms. The costs arises from defective items may be
problem to a garment manufacturing firms. The high
requirement of manufacturing items and defective
items can lead to less gain to firms. If the outcome is
of accepted quality, it may reach the client.
7. Over Processing:
Most of the garment processes are vital to the lean
concept which tends to minimize the garment
wastage. Many research articles point out to the over
processing is more important to reduce the wastages
in firms. As a result, it is important to focus at all
Vijayakumar et al., International Journal of Advanced Engineering Technology E-ISSN 0976-3945
operations in garment firms as potential waste.
Incorrect processing results from the wrong set of
tools,
low
standard
machines,
lack
of
communications and unnecessary information
regarding product changes without process changes
[13]. When approaching the simple concept may be
more valuable. Each manufacturing process in
garment industries is assumed to be value added
activities. Most of the manufacturing processes are
vital to the lean method which results in minimizing
the garment wastage. Consequently, it is significant
to concentrate at all processes in garment industries
as potential waste. Many research articles indicate the
over processing is more significant to eliminate the
wastages in firms. The methodologies in sanctioning
production process from top level management in
garment industries are unfortunately to be a non
value added activity. In appropriate processing, when
quality controls department indentify the rejected
items, the products need to re-design the garment
manufacturing firms. In over Processing, when
department of quality controls determine the
defectives, the items needs to re-designing the
garment firms
8. Under Utilizationof People:
Labors are the major important assets when it comes
to ensuring that firms accomplish their targets [13].
Generally employee turnover is one of the critical
factors that lead to loss in productivity of a garment
firms. Major issues in firms are mainly related to
employee versus machines and equipments. The
employee turnover has received major consideration
of higher level management, Production department
and Human resource department. The major
challenge of production engineer is to assign required
work, suitable jobs and demanding leadership to
different class of people employed to achieve the
goals of garment firms such that customer is
satisfied. However, this work is rarely accomplished
absolutely in the firms. This leads to ineffectiveness
of process carried out by that labor in garments.
On the basis of these seven wastes and its thirty eight
types of cause about garments, framed from literature
review [13] the following Table 2 is framed. This
table 2clearly represents the dependability of Man,
Machine and Material against various types of wastes
framed by discussing with production supervisors,
chief executives and lean experts of garments.
Table 2: Profile-Wastes matrix in garment firms
Typesof
garment wastes
Over
Production
Transportatio
n
Defects
Inventory
Over
processing
Motion
Waiting
Under
Utilisation Of
People
Causes
Unlevelled scheduling
Un balanced work load
Lengthy process step
Misuse of automation
Large batch size
Poor plant layout
Large storage area
Poor understanding of the process flow for production
Longer lead times
Seaming defects
Sewing Defects
Placement Defects
Fabric defects
Embroidery defects
Unlevelled scheduling
Poor market forecast
Un balanced work load
Unreliable shipment by suppliers
Styles changes without process changes
Lack of information about process
Customer true requirement not properly defined
Redundant approvals
Over processing to accommodate expected down time
Large items located on upper or lower shelf
A machine that unnecessary travelling distances
Finding necessary equipment and tools for concern production process
Unnecessary motion from work place to retrieve materials or utilize
machines
Unplanned Tools for Work Place
Lack of space in organization in manufacturing area for keeps the
components
Poor scheduling of production process
Time taken for signature approval from higher officials to take require
decision
Improper arrangements of machines for process sequence
In adequate servicing of machines
Challenge of the production manager is to allocate right responsibilities
Challenge of the production manager is to allocate right authorities
Challenge of the production manager is to allocate right jobs
Whether employee possessing high theoretical knowledge is allotted
practice-oriented job
Whether technique used for avoiding under utilization of the people is the
scheduling of their jobs
4.2 Pareto Analysis
Int J AdvEngg Tech/Vol. VII/Issue II/April-June,2016/251-260
Man
✓
✓
Responsibilities
Machine
Material
✓
✓
✓
✓
Others
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
✓
By using the Profile-Wastes matrix in garment firms
Vijayakumar et al., International Journal of Advanced Engineering Technology E-ISSN 0976-3945
Table (2) the percentage of man, machine, materials
and others affects the garment manufacturing
scenario are determined, which are shown in figure
(2) with the help of Pareto chart. By Pareto analysis it
has been found that Man is responsible for most of
the waste and mistakes. Machine breakdown also
makes many problems such as failure of production,
defect of garments etc.
In selected garment industry attaining 11.29 % of
defective items and suffered lot due to rejections. In
order to eliminate these defectives, by the study
under literature review, the researcher suggests for
implementing the DMIAC concept. The quality of
garment is calculated through process map (SIPOC)
output in table 3.
2. Measure
In this stage understanding of existing scenario of
selected garment firms to initial calculation. The
defective items of executive shirts, pants and T-shirts
was measured and mentioned in table 4.
3. Analysis
In this stage deals the optimum solution attained
through root cause of the garment process. According
to Cause and effect diagram found the solution for
defectives
4. Improve
In this stage is to determine the solutions for selected
garment industry problem. This research attained the
elimination of considerable amount of garment
defectives through brainstorming with the help of
literature review.
5. Control
In this stage controlled garment defectives nearly this
works eliminated the garment defectives from
11.29% to 5.27% for profit earned Rs 2075959/- in
selected garment firms by lean tools. In table 6the
percentage of defectives found in quality department
before and after implementation of lean tools and
techniques
Figure 2: Pareto analysis for factors affecting the
garment manufacturing scenario
4.5 Findings and Analysis
4.5.1 Findings and Analysis of DMAIC through
Cause and effective analysis
Most of the garments followed DMAIC approach
elimination of their defects and attaining excellence
of the product. In many manufacturing industries
adapted to structured DMAIC concept for their
continuous improvement and attaining for more
profit. DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve
and Control) of six sigma methodology is one of
analytical tool to root cause for existing
manufacturing scenario for eliminating the maximum
percentage of defectives.
1. Define
Table 3. SIPOC flow for sujitha garments and exporters
Suppliers
Inputs
Processes
Outputs
Sujatha fashion
Unstitched
Sewing
Shirts, pants and
Garment manufacturers
Garment
Section
T-shirts
&exporters
Machinery
Customers
Amico paradiso canada
Table 4.Percentage of defective garment items before implementing DMAIC and 5S concept
Areas
Man
Machine
Method
Material
Causes
Lack of interest
Improper training and unskilled operator
Excessive thread tension
Bent sewing machine needle
High pressure on the pressure foot
Improper size of the needle
Needle inserted is improper
Long stitch for type of fabric in work
Low quality thread
Low quality needle
Areas
Man
Machine
Method
Material
Solutions
Improve supervision
Skilled operators requirements
Maintain proper thread tensions.
New needle and knife should be replaced
Reduce the pressure on the presser foot.
Make sure that the positions of needle and bottom are
fed by proper type and size
Insert the needle in correct position.
Reduce the length of stitch by using the stitch regulator
High quality thread should be used
Replace another brand with high quality needle
Table 5. Solution for all major defects with its Causes
Causes
Solutions
Lack of interest
Improve supervision
Improper training and unskilled operator
Skilled operators requirements
Excessive thread tension
Maintain proper thread tensions.
Bent sewing machine needle
New needle and knife should be replaced
High pressure on the pressure foot
Reduce the pressure on the presser foot.
Improper size of the needle
Make sure that the positions of needle and
bottom are fed by proper type and size
Needle inserted is improper
Insert the needle in correct position.
Long stitch for type of fabric in work
Reduce the length of stitch by using the
stitch regulator
Low quality thread
High quality thread should be used
Low quality needle
Replace another brand with high quality
needle
Int J AdvEngg Tech/Vol. VII/Issue II/April-June,2016/251-260
Vijayakumar et al., International Journal of Advanced Engineering Technology E-ISSN 0976-3945
Table 6. Percentage of defective garment items after implementing DMAIC and 5S concept
Garment
Inspected
Defective
Percentage of defective
S.No
items
piece
items
items
1
Shirts
5514
359
6.51
2
Pants
7830
425
5.42
3
T-shirt
10637
482
4.53
Fig 3.Cause and effect diagram for significant wastes in sewing section
4.5.2 Findings and Analysis of 5s
Figure 4. Step by Step methodology for implementing
5S concept in garment firms for lean manufacturing
paradigm
Int J AdvEngg Tech/Vol. VII/Issue II/April-June,2016/251-260
The concept5S has its origin in Japan in the later part
of 20th century. 5S can be applied to any firms in all
sections as a starting point of improvement actions. A
variety of research work has been conducted
throughout year depicting the importance of
implementing 5S in industrial sector.5S is a method
which simplifies the garment work environment,
eliminates the garment wastes and non-value added
activities while reducing defectives, and improving
productivity and safety. Measuring the effect of 5S
system in performance improvement of a small scale
industry [14].The 5S concepts concentrate on
effective work place of firms and standardized work
procedures. Each of the five S's indicate the first
letter of five Japanese words like Seiri, Seiton, Seiso,
Seiketsu, and Shitsuke that outline the steps involved
in better workplace environment and good
housekeeping.
From Table 7.Clearly indicates that, fourteen types of
problem may affect in all sections of garment like
administrative office, sample, stitching, fabric,
cutting, finishing and embroidery etc through data
collection method. Through the data collection
method various problems can be determined &more
attention can be given on eliminating garment wastes
Vijayakumar et al., International Journal of Advanced Engineering Technology E-ISSN 0976-3945
for eliminating garments defectives and improving
manufacturing performance. Action taken for all
problems occurs in garment manufacturing firms
through 5S tools. Every garment industry can
implement
lean
concepts
for
improving
manufacturing efficiency. Under 5S concepts all
garments items should arranged orderly in such a
way so that they are simple to use and label them so
that they are easy to find and store the garment items.
Have to keep more attention in keeping the better
work place environment, sweeping in all floors,
properly cleaning machinery and generally ensure the
everything stays clean.
1.Seiri (Sort)
Seiri’ means ‘sorting’. That is, to sort and discard;
sorting things into necessary and unnecessary
item[15].It is an action to identify and sort the
available items garments at workplace as required
and unneeded items for further processing. Remove
all unneeded items of garments. The objective of
doing this is preventing disturbance and overloading
caused by needless garment items. Now sort the
wanted garments as low use, average use and high
use garment materials. Keep things of low use, which
you use once in year. Place the things of average use
(used once or twice in two months or 6 months) in
the centre and things of high use, which you use
frequently, can be kept right at the workstation. For
example, while carrying out this stage, the location of
the tool and components in workplace is specified in
garment firms. This significantly eliminates the delay
in picking up the necessary tools and components
while carrying out the garment operations. This
action required for stage are unnecessary garment
material in all section of firms, left over present
garment materials, defectives garment pieces on
concern floors which shown in table 3.
2. Seiton (Set-in-Order)
This stage comprises in arranging right materials at
right place for access and disposal quickly. Here,
organizing refers to the systematic arrangement of
equipments, tools and items to provide workers with
the most efficient access. Seiton results in minimum
time in accessing garment materials and disposing
them for garments manufacturing. In these
consequences, the garments firm meets the higher
productivity. Seition is mainly for eliminating the
garment waste namely unnecessary motion. In this
stage, the layout is drawn for accessing tools and
components for manufacturing operations are
earmarked using labels and stickers. This stage will
facilitate the movement of only for required tools and
components. The vital objective is that if anyone
wants something they could get it within 15 to 20
seconds at our workplace.
3. Seiso (Shine)
Seiso’ means ‘shine / super clean’. That is, to keep
work areas clean. Seiso is a daily activity for
Japanese companies [15].Seiso is capable of reducing
the garment waste namely the defective garment
items. One of the activities in garment carried out
under this stage is the exclusion of unneeded
drawings for garment manufacturing. In this
example, this activity enables the easy location
accurate drawing and elimination the referencing of
Int J AdvEngg Tech/Vol. VII/Issue II/April-June,2016/251-260
obsolete drawings, and thus, the manufacturing of
defective items is avoided. Do not wait until the
workstation obtain dirty. Regularly clean your
workplace, including your furniture items, equipment
so that they do not get a possibility to get dirty.
4. Seiketsu :
The stage Seiketsu may be employed to eliminate
underutilisation of facilities. To establish standard so
that areas stay cleaned up in order to ensure smooth
work-flow in the work-place [15].Sometimes it is
difficult to follow all of the 5s concepts. But while
sustaining the 5s pillars it is possible to eliminate a
huge number unwanted materials, equipments,
machines etc, which will take a protective step in
maintaining capital resources in a proper way. This
will be gainful for the firms. If 5s pillars are
maintained & everybody, every worker is concerned
about it, they can do with comfort in a systematic
way. So Standardize must be followed for 5s pillars.
To standardize the first 3S in the firms the following
steps are to be maintained.
a. Have to maintain and monitor the first three
Ss.
b. A Regular audit should be run to find out
Excess/unneeded machine, table, basket,
trolley are in area.
c. Every responsibility should be assigned for
production line and motivated through
salary incentives.
d. Have to introduce Checklist for all cleaning
and maintenance of machines, materials,
equipments etc. e. Have to fix quantities &
limits for inventory, machines, materials,
equipments etc.
5. Shitsuke:
‘Shitsuke’ Means ‘To Sustain’. That is, to establish
procedures for safe working environment [15]. The
stage Shitsuke is competent of eliminating the lean
waste namely underutilization of people. In stage,
right procedures can be implementing to finish the
manufacturing operations and the necessary and
suitable training and educational programs are to be
imparted to the right personnel. This stage will make
certain that the personnel in the garment firms carry
out the right activities by following the proper
procedures which will enable those right activities to
achieve them in minimum possible duration. This
phase highlight the application of visual management
principles. Implementation of this phase ensures that
the entire manufacturing activities of the firms are
totally visible so that the stoppages of facilities could
be simply and visually manifested. Thus, the idle
facilities are determined and the underutilization of
the facilities is reduced.
Procedure for maintaining 5S concepts
For following 5S Concepts, the following steps have
to be maintained.
• Every garment employee should be
followed 5s concepts.
• All employees should have a good idea
about 5s.
• 5s checklists/standards should be followed.
• Workers should be trained under 5s
concepts.
Vijayakumar et al., International Journal of Advanced Engineering Technology E-ISSN 0976-3945
Table 7: 5S and Waste Elimination Matrix
Identified
problems
Sample
Dept
Fabric
Stores
Files Arrangement
Floor Marking
Trolleys
Rejection On Floor
Labels
Unnecessary items
Sub Store
Leftover Present
Visual Controls
Pathways Defined
Dust And Stains
Racks And Bins
Visible Sops
No
Partial
Partial
No
No
Yes
No
Yes
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
Partial
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
No
Yes
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
No
Yes
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
Partial
No
Yes
No
No
No
Yes
No
No
Yes
No
No
No
Partial
Partial
Yes
No
Yes
No
Yes
No
No
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
No
Yes
No
No
Yes
No
No
Workers Training
Over 5s
No
No
No
No
No
No
Office
Area
Action
Required
No
No
No
Yes
No
Yes
No
Yes
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
No
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
Seiton
Seiton
Seiton
Seiri
Seiton
Seiri
Seiton
Seiri
Seiton
Seiketsu
Seiso
Seiton
Seiketsu
No
No
Seiton
Cutting Stitching Finishing Packing
Table.8Defects of garment items after implementation of 5S and DMAIC concept
S.N
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
Garment Items
Executive Readymade
shirts Design.1
Design.2
Design.3
Design.4
Design.5
Design.6
Design.7
Executive Readymade pants
Design.1
Design.2
Design.3
Design.4
Design.5
Design.6
Design.7
Design.8
Design.9
Design.10
Executive Ready made Tshirts (variety No. One)
Design.2
Design.3
Design.4
Design.5
Design.6
Design.7
Design.8
Design.9
Design.10
Total
Inspected
pieces
Defectives
items
Rate per
piece
Total amount
loss due to
Defective items
Manufacturing
lead time per
piece in
(minutes)
1000
49
1200
58800
165
1150
650
690
828
995
201
60
48
50
54
61
37
970
869
1370
965
1569
1415
58200
41712
68500
52110
95709
52355
167
176
164
171
159
166
900
43
1647
70821
225
750
920
1020
585
1005
1200
200
1050
200
50
26
58
47
46
52
30
45
28
64350
30342
85086
77409
77832
66924
52530
79515
32676
1300
61
1287
1167
1467
1647
1692
1287
1751
1767
1167
220
222
227
221
234
239
210
264
205
249
105
1210
1117
1232
1222
936
1236
913
965
506
23981
48
61
51
35
58
44
52
38
34
1266
267
12816
7442
7905
7000
24766
11836
18720
7600
6698
1183074
CONCLUSION
This case study research has extracted an overall
scenario of the garments of the selected garments
industry for minimizing manufacturing defectives. In
this connection lean manufacturing concept is
implemented as a new concept of manufacturing in
the garments of the studied garments industry. From
5S analysis, it has been found that a lot of
unnecessary items exist in the garment firms like
garment waste material and unwanted tools and
Int J AdvEngg Tech/Vol. VII/Issue II/April-June,2016/251-260
122
155
200
427
269
360
200
197
25654
13420
97
110
103
100
94
111
101
105
89
4479
equipments.
From
DMAIC
methodology
considerable amount of garment defectives are
eliminated. Sometimes garment materials are not put
away immediately after work. The garment worker
will feel more comfortable at work and the
continuous improvement actions will tends to
minimum waste and good quality of items, which
improves the firm’s competitiveness and profitability.
Before 5s analysis and DMAIC methodology various
types of lean wastes were determined and the causes
Vijayakumar et al., International Journal of Advanced Engineering Technology E-ISSN 0976-3945
behind all these garment wastes have been analyzed.
Some amount of motion also considerably reduced in
garment industry after implementing 5S concept and
discussed in previous research article. This activity
was performed on eight different garment firms
through DMAIC and 5S Japanese way of
housekeeping some immense results come in very
short time of period. It is required to continue the
audit activity on regular basis and allocated resources
and budget to maintain the 5S. The 5S committee
need to propagate the philosophy to every employee
by training and awareness program and a continuous
improvement of garment operation is required to
enhance the production and reduce the wastages. It is
also recommended to introduce the award and
penalization system to inspire the employees over 5S.
After implementation of 5s concepts and DMAIC
concept can increase ethical, make good impressions
on customers, increase efficiency of production line
for cost reduced from Rs 3259033 to Rs 1183074.
Total profit earned Rs 2075959/- after implementing
5S and other lean tools such as cellular
manufacturing and team work concept mentioned in
table 7. In previous article discussed about
implementation of Cellular manufacturing and team
work concept. Every employee feel very pleasant
about where they work, the effect on continuous
improvement can tends to minimize the garment
waste, minimize the defectives of garment materials
from 11.29 % to 5.27%, and some amount of motion
and also lead times is also reduced by implementing
5S concept.
RECOMMENDATIONS
1. Dust of garment items occurred in all
production line but all the workers didn’t
wear mask, so they cannot work comfortably
in this condition. As a result labor
productivity as well as productivity of the
workplace is decreased.
2. it should be inspected properly to ensure that
there is no shading before receiving fabrics
from cutting section
3. To overcome the human mistakes by
following 5S concepts and shortage of
employee by estimates the optimum numbers
of operator wants per day.
4. it should be checked
whether foreign
particles present in the fabrics
5. Proper and adequate training could be
provided to the inexperienced garment
employees so that they should have good
knowledge and consciousness about the
manufacturing process of various machines
in garments.
6. Daily 5S housekeeping should be adopted
and sustained properly in garments for
effective utilization of workplace and for
continuous improvement.
7. Proper infrastructure (lighting arrangement)
is made for garment operator.
8. A proper on-time maintenance system
should be provided for various machines in
garment so that it is possible to reduce
machine breakdown time
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