Case Study
Siddall and Hilton Products doesn’t just manufacture a
diverse range of products, it does so in a wide variety of sizes
and order quantities. 60-70% of all orders are Make to Stock
(MTS) with the remainder being bespoke. Depending on what
product is on which of the company’s state-of-the-art
machines, production rates can be as high as 15 seconds per
panel with each order potentially running for hours if not
days. And as Operations Director Phil Goy explains, the
majority of orders tend to be a “complete mix of
everything.” A brief overview of the actual manufacturing
process begins to illustrate the business challenges that the
company faces on a daily basis as well as at a strategic level.
The raw material stock arrives on 1 tonne coils of wire which
are then loaded onto decoilers that feed through various
straighteners into the main section of the machine.
Depending on the size of the panel, there may be up to 61
decoilers which need to be loaded, with coils up to 1 tonne
in weight. It is no wonder that Goy remarks, “Set-up and
changeover times are areas that clearly need to be
monitored and optimised!”
Quality Control (QC) is a mixture of batch testing finished
product as well as ongoing monitoring by the company’s
highly skilled workforce and is another area where accurate
monitoring and optimising is vital as Goy explains. “Our
workforce is highly skilled in locating problems as quickly as
possible and each time there is a problem the operator has to
stop the machine. Maximising machine uptime is central to
our success as a company.” Siddall and Hilton Products has
long since recognised the value of optimising efficiency
which is why it operates a series of kanbans with varying
replenishment levels across its 150 most popular live stock
items that automatically trigger re-order alerts. The
company has also undertaken a considerable investment in
employing Lean manufacturing philosophies as well as
purchasing some of the most advanced machinery of its kind
anywhere in the world. Its latest acquisition is one of only 2
such machines in existence and cost in excess of £3 million.
Recent investments in production scheduling software and
specialist on-site technical personnel have brought efficiency
gains but as Goy explains, “visibility of what was happening,
and more importantly, why something was not happening,
remained a missing piece of the equation.”
Siddall & Hilton Products Ltd | Data Collection
“Perhaps the most significant potential area of
savings will come from the business intelligence
that the Seiki system delivers in terms of
assisting with evaluating significant capital
investment.”
Seiki Data Collection & Analysis
• Improves the accuracy and speed of data collection
• Enables you to identify the real reasons for lost productivity
• Contributes to the effectiveness of APS systems by providing
live and accurate data
• Provides longer term trend analysis to better understand the
impact of changes and new strategies
• Collect process data that may be critical to your quality
standards
• Supports improvements to manufacturing processes such as
flow of W.I.P., minimising scrap and machine downtime
• Supports lean manufacturing and continuous improvement
programs to maximise output, minimise waste and drive
down manufacturing costs
The company was aware that setup times
were often taking too long but not sure
which elements of the set ups were taking
the
time.
Similarly,
unscheduled
breakdowns would often occur and it wasn’t
clear why and there was no means of
knowing how long a machine may be idle as
a result. The Operations Management work
for one shift a day, the machines for three
Shifts, and monitoring of performance was
inadequate. Goy again, “Any errors or
problems were manually written on a piece
of A4 paper which was then entered into a
spreadsheet at the end of the day which
eventually, hopefully somebody might analyse. In short, the process
was time consuming, wasteful of resource, and led to information that
was questionable, analysis that was sporadic and nil action.”
Recognising that accurate, real-time data was essential to the
company’s ongoing efficiency plans, Goy was tasked with sourcing an
appropriate solution. In order to demonstrate the benefits of
collecting machine activity data a Seiki account manager came on-site
complete with a demo-box and ran a simulation based on live data.
Understanding the importance of getting buy-in from all relevant
people in the company, Goy assembled a team comprising the
Managing Director, the Production Planner, relevant technicians and
operatives, the company IT specialist and Quality Control personnel.
Seiki Systems Ltd
T: 01273 666999
E: sales@seikisystems.co.uk
W: www.seikisystems.co.uk
Contact Us
Siddall and Hilton Products Ltd is a leading European
manufacturer of steel wire fence and welded mesh
products. The privately owned company has a pedigree
stretching over a century and this part of the group now
boasts a turnover of £20m. Its 75 skilled personnel use the
latest technology combined with lean manufacturing
methodologies to manufacture products found in such
diverse places as health and safety guarding, pet cages,
school perimeter fencing and protecting armed forces in
live conflict zones. When you produce 1,700 tonnes of
product every month, even small efficiency gains can lead
to substantial cost and time savings, which is why Siddall
and Hilton Products invested in the latest Machine
Monitoring and Shop Floor Data Collection (SFDC)
technology from Seiki Systems.
© Seiki Systems Ltd
Case Study
“This was an essential step in demonstrating the importance
of improving the uptime of our resources through improved
visibility of machine activity and individual job performance”
explains Goy. “I was able to show everyone by fast
forwarding through 20 hours of video footage just how many
stoppages we were having and how little we knew about each
one. This was contrasted with the way the Seiki system
monitored every stoppage, the reason for every stoppage,
and the ability to then analyse the reasons. “It was clear that
Seiki theoretically could do what we needed – all we needed
to do was build a capital case to get the go-ahead.” Goy
already knew that the company had lost 130 productive shifts
on just one machine in the previous year due to changeovers
with each shift costing approximately £800. Incremental
profit lost due to changeovers approximates £18k. A
projected 20% efficiency saving from the Seiki System would
therefore be £3.6k p.a. When the same analysis was applied
to reductions in scrap and rework it became clear that the
company was looking at a Return on Investment (ROI) in
under 2 years. And this was only for one machine with each
of the other machines having an even quicker ROI due to the
expertise that would be acquired in setting up the first
machine.
Seiki Systems Ltd
Olivier House, 18 Marine Parade, Brighton, BN2 1TL
T: 01273 666999
F: 01273 602564
E: sales@seikisystems.co.uk
W: www.seikisystems.co.uk
Contact Us
The final Seiki solution comprises its seamlessly integrated
Machine Monitoring and SFDC system with electronic work
queues, which works in partnership with the company’s
existing planning and scheduling package to deliver and
capture critical, meaningful job/operation and machine
status data for subsequent performance analysis. Now
whenever a machine is stopped, whether by an operator or
automatically at a machine level, the data is instantly
recorded. If stopped by an operator, the reason for stoppage
has to be manually entered along with any subsequent
actions. Not only is the duration of each subsequent action
logged, but the time between an information request and
that information being supplied is also stored. This became
especially useful when the company trialled a move to a 24x7
shift basis. Goy reflects on the impact this made. “With each
passing day we had a growing insight into machine activity
and inactivity which we could analyse by shift, operator, and
stoppage code. It wasn’t long before we had enough visual
information to drill down into to know where the biggest
areas of efficiency gain could be most quickly achieved.” On
the first live machine this led to an innovative reworking of
the 61 decoilers and workflow which has reduced the most
common changeover time from 4.5 shifts to 1.5 shifts. This
combined with other efficiency gains that are directly
attributable to the Seiki System has led to an effective
doubling of machine uptime. And when the other systems
came online, the company very quickly began to accurately
see how each machine had different areas of potential
improvement.
Goy again, “We could clearly see what we already knew, that 1
machine works better with multiple changeovers with medium
duration runs whereas another has much longer setup times but much
fewer stoppages. The Seiki output allows us to visualise and quantify
improvement opportunities.”
Goy is convinced that the company is still only scratching the surface
of the system’s potential yet it has already delivered an impressive
range of benefits. “The fact that we measure and know we measure
everything has brought company wide accountability and people are
taking responsibility for what they do and don’t do.” Far from being
used to punitively check who’s not doing what, the system is actually
being used to help identify areas where workers may require further
training. “We may have a situation where someone is asked to work on
a task with adequate but not the best training. Now we can identify
where best practice is happening across our workforce and share that
with everyone to help them do their job better. This has helped
increase trust in the system amongst the workforce.” He continues,
“The more data we collect, the more we can begin to identify trends
which lets us move beyond understanding what’s happening and when
and to start to uncover underlying reasons which allows us to take
preventative measures.” Another benefit comes from the elimination
of the paper trail where information is now 100% visible and useable.
“Previously events may have occurred overnight or over a weekend
which operators on a morning shift may not have been made aware of,”
explains Goy. “Now operators are always working to the latest work-to
lists based on the most up-to-date schedule.” When it comes to cost
savings, it’s hard to make before/after comparisons because of the
unavailability of prior accurate data but Goy estimates a minimum of
£1500 per month.
Looking ahead, perhaps the most significant potential area of savings
will come from the business intelligence that the Seiki system delivers
in terms of assisting with evaluating significant capital investment. Goy
notes that data from the Seiki system is at the heart of a current
investment project of several hundreds of thousands of pounds but one
which promises potential savings measurable in millions of pounds.
Goy reflects on the reasons for the company’s success thus far with the
Seiki system. “The most important part of the implementation is
involving all interested parties at an early stage and to remove fear of
giving accurate information. The system must be very simple to use or
it won’t be used. Shopfloor people consider their job to be producing
not inputting information; if it is difficult to do it won’t be done
properly. What gets measured improves, and simply making the data
visible and accessible encourages people to strive harder.”
www.sandhp.com
Seiki Systems' suite of manufacturing execution software can be
utilised for planning, controlling and improving the works order
lifecycle - from top floor to shop floor - of any manufacturing company.
Visibility and control of all stages of the manufacturing process is
essential. Creating a leaner systematic approach can result in
significant capacity and efficiency improvements that can lead to real
cost reductions.