Facility Layout

Layout Planning
Layout planning in manufacturing and service organizations involves the physical
arrangement of various resources available in the system to improve the performance of the
operating system, thereby providing better customer service.
The basic objective of layout design is to facilitate a smooth flow of work, material, and
information through the system.
Supporting objectives:
◦ To facilitate attainment of product or service quality.
◦ To use workers and space efficiently.
◦ To avoid bottlenecks.
◦ To minimize material handling costs.
◦ To eliminate unnecessary movements of workers or materials.
◦ To minimize production time or customer service time.
◦ To design for safety.
Types of Layout Planning
Operations management researchers and practitioners have evolved four major types of
layouts.
a. Product Layout
b. Process Layout
c. Fixed Position Layout
d. Group Technology Layout.
Fixed Position Layout
Transformed resources do not move between the transforming resources.
The reasons for this could be that the product is too large to be moved conveniently or
it might be too delicate to move, or perhaps it could be object to being moved.
Example: Shipbuilding
Locomotive Engines
Process Layout
 The needs and convenience of the transforming resources which constitute the
processes in the operation dominate the layout.
 In Process Layout, similar processes
(or Processes with similar needs) are
located together.

• Arrange work centers so as to

minimize the costs of material
handling
Product Layout
Product layout involves locating the transforming resources entirely for the
convenience of the transformed resources.
In this case, the order in which the resources are placed exactly follows the process
sequence dictated by a product.
The transformed resources ‘flow’ along a ‘line’ of processes.
Also, known as ‘line’ layout.
Product Layouts are used to achieve a smooth and rapid flow of large volumes of goods
or customers through a system.
The final assembly in several manufacturing plants follows a product layout.
Product Layout
The assembly workstations are designed in such a manner that at each workstation a
part of the job is completed.
The feeder stations are linked to the assembly workstations to ensure material
availability. As the product moves through the assembly, the process is completed.
Testing, final inspection, and even packing could be part of this layout, so that at the end
of the line it is ready for dispatch to the market.
If you visit the Chinchwad plant of Tata Motors at Pune, you will notice that there are
nearly 180 workstations involved in the final assembly of the Tata Indica. As the chassis
moves through these stations, the car is assembled in a progressive fashion, and at the
end the car is ready for dispatch.
Product Layout
Product Layout
The major concern in a product layout is balancing the assembly line so that no one
workstation becomes a bottleneck and holds up the flow of work through the line.

A product layout needs material moved in one direction along the assembly line and
always in the same pattern.
Advantages and Disadvantages of
Product Layout
Advantages:-
1.A high rate of output.
2. Low unit cost due to high volume. The high cost of specialized equipment is spread
over many units.
3. A high utilization of labor and equipment.
4. The establishment of routing and scheduling in the initial design of the system.
These activities do not require much attention once the system is operating.
Disadvantages:-
1.The system is fairly inflexible in response to changes in the volume of output or
changes in product or process design.
2.The system is highly susceptible to shutdowns caused by equipment breakdowns.
Design of Product layout
A two-wheeler manufacturer sold nearly 3,422,400 motorcycles in 2013–2014, which
translates into a monthly sale of 285,200.
It is expected that the daily production of vehicles is nearly 11,400.
Various sub-assemblies in the Bajaj plant need to be configured to match the production
rate.
Similarly, the final assembly stations also need to have the required number of
resources at each station to meet the targeted demand.
 Required a balanced flow of components on the shop floor.
Design of Product Layout
The layout design seeks to identify the minimum number of resources required to meet
a targeted production rate and the order in which these resources are to be arranged.
Let us consider a mass production system with multiple tasks such as the manufacture
of computers. If you visit the final assembly shop of the plant, you will invariably find a
line layout.
Initially the mother board will be assembled with the required components. As it
proceeds, the hard disk, optical drives, fans, power systems, serial, parallel and USB
ports, and SMPS will be added to the box before it is finally secured with the cover
plate.
Each task requires a finite time, denoted by and may have some precedence
relationships with the other tasks.
Further, the tasks require certain skills and resources such as machines and tools.
Design of Product Layout
Line balancing is a method by which the tasks are optimally combined without
violating precedence constraints and a certain number of workstations are designed to
complete the tasks.
If there are three workstations, A, B, and C, in which 7 tasks are performed in a
manufacturing system, then the workstation times are nothing but the summation of the
task times assigned to each workstation.
Clearly, a balanced design is one in which the workstation times do not vary widely.
Cycle time could be considered as the reciprocal of production rate. If in a period of
20,000 seconds a shop produced 10,000 pieces of a component, then the production rate
is ½ per second. Conversely, the cycle time is 2 seconds.
Design of Product Layout
Cycle time could be actual or desired.

The problem of designing a balanced set of workstations suffers from the classical trade-off
issue.
If we combine more tasks into fewer workstations, we may require fewer workstations but
the cycle time will be high, leading to reduced production rate.
At the other extreme, if the tasks are kept separate and as many workstations are designed,
we may increase the production rate beyond what is required at the risk of deploying more
resources and workers with poor utilization.
Therefore, solving the line-balancing problem calls for counterbalancing these opposing
costs and striking the right trade-off between increased production and better utilization of
resources
Design of Product Layout
The production rate, cycle time and the number of workstations are interrelated.
These relationships are indicated in the following expressions:
Design of Product Layout
 Two Constraints
a. Precedence requirements- are the physical restrictions on the order in which
operations are performed on the assembly line.
Which operations must precede others, which can be done concurrently, which
must wait until later- are the important input to the product layout.
b. Maximum Desired cycle time
Design of Product Layout
A computer manufacturer needs to design assembly stations in the factory where the
cabinet housing the hard disk, mother board and other accessories is to be made. The
factory currently works for one shift of 8 hours. The tasks and their durations are given
in Table below and the precedence relationship among the tasks.
Tasks Description Duration (Seconds) Task(s) that must precede
A Assemble & position the base unit 70 -
B Install the hard disk 80 A
C Install the mother board 40 A
D Insert Ports 20 A
E Install Speaker 40 A
F Connect relevant modules 30 B,C
G Install Controller 50 C
H Visual Inspection and cover plate 50 F, G, D, E
Design of Product Layout
A. If the cycle time is 80 seconds, what will the daily production of cabinets be?
B. If the desired production rate is 320 cabinets per day, what is the maximum
permissible cycle time?
C. What is the minimum number of workstations required to maintain this daily
production rate?
D. Design an assembly set-up w.r.t to the production rate of 320 cabinets per day
E. Design an assembly set-up when the cycle time is 80 seconds. What are the key
inferences of this exercise?
Design of Product Layout
A. Total available time = If the cycle time is 80 seconds, the daily production

B. Since the desired production rate is only 320 cabinets, one can obtain the maximum
permissible cycle time for the assembly stations will be

•The computations show that while a cycle time of 80 seconds may yield a much higher
production rate.
•Once the cycle time crosses 90 seconds, the manufacturer may not be able to produce
320 cabinets every day.
Design of product layout
•The sum of all task times is 380 seconds. Therefore, combining all the tasks into a single
workstation will result in a cycle time of 380 seconds. This is not permissible.
•Therefore, the minimum number of workstations is dictated by the maximum cycle time
permissible.
C. Minimum number of workstation will be

•As long as we have five workstations, our cycle time may not exceed 90 seconds and we
will be able to meet the production rate.
Design of product layout
D. Design of assembly line with five work stations:-

1. Draw the precedence diagram.

2. We assign tasks to the five workstations on the

basis of the following two criteria:

• The workstation times should not exceed the

maximum permissible cycle time of 90 seconds.

• The precedence relationships among the tasks

need to be honoured
Design of product layout
Workstation 1 Workstation 2 Workstation 3 Workstation 4 Workstation 5
Task Assigned A, D B C,G E,F H
Workstation 90 80 90 70 50
Times
Cycle Time 90 90 90 90 90
Idle Time 0 10 0 20 40
Resource 100% 89% 100% 78% 56%
Utilization

The average utilization of the resources can be computed as follows:

Design of product layout
When cycle time is 80 seconds, the minimum number of stations required is .
As per the criteria of design of assembly setup, we can design the assembly setup with
5 workstations and cycle time of 80 seconds.

Workstation 1 Workstation 2 Workstation 3 Workstation 4 Workstation 5 WorkStation 6

Task Assigned A B C, D E, F G H
Workstation 70 80 60 70 50 50
Times
Cycle Time 80 80 80 80 80 80
Idle Time 10 0 20 10 30 30
Resource 87.5% 100% 75% 87.5% 62.5% 62.5%
Utilization
Design of product layout
The average resource utilization value will be:

Key inferences:
•Clearly show the trade-off issues in line balancing.
•A design with five workstations will meet the current production rate with an average
utilization of 84.4 per cent.
•However, when we increase the number of workstations by one, the utilization comes down
by 4.8 per cent, but the production rate could increase by 11.1 per cent.
•There are cost and strategic implications of these two alternatives and management could
take appropriate decision at the time of finalizing it.
Second Example…..
The Model J Wagon is to be assembled on a conveyor belt. Five hundred wagons are
required per day. Production time per day is 420 minutes, and the assembly steps and
times for the wagon are given below. Assignment: Find the balance that minimizes the
number of workstations, subject to cycle time and precedence constraints.
Second Example…..
Second Example…..
•Production time per day =420 mins.
•Cycle time =
•Determine the theoretical minimum number of workstations =.
Second Example…..
Workstation 1 Workstation 2 Workstation 3 Workstation 4 Workstation 5
Task Assigned A D B, C, E, H F, G, I, J K
Workstation 45 sec 50 sec 47 sec 44 sec 9 sec
Times
Cycle Time 50.4 sec 50.4 sec 50.4 sec 50.4 sec 50.4 sec
Idle Time 5.4 sec 0.4 sec 3.4 sec 6.4 sec 41.4 sec
Resource 89.2% 99.2% 93.2% 87.3% 17.8%
Utilization

195
𝐴𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑎𝑔𝑒 𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑐𝑒 𝑢𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑖𝑧𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛= =7 7 . 4 %
5 ×50.4
Process Layout
A process or a functional layout is an arrangement of resources on the basis of the
process characteristics of the resources.
Each department in a process layout is typically organized into functional groups.
For example, a low-volume toy factory might consist of the shipping and receiving
workcenter, the plastic molding and stamping workcenter, the metal forming workcenter,
the sewing workcenter, and the painting workcenter.
Optimal placement often means placing workcenters with large amounts of
interdepartment traffic adjacent to one another.
Design of the process layout
The steps involved in design of process layout:
a. The first step is to identify the number of departments required and the space
requirements for each department.
b. The second step is to estimate the magnitude of flow across these departments.
c. The last step is to use the above information to arrive at the final layout of the
departments so that the cost of material handing is minimized.
Design of process layout
Suppose we want to arrange the eight workcenters of a toy factory to minimize the
interdepartmental material handling cost. Initially, let us make the simplifying
assumption that all workcenters have the same amount of space (say, 40 feet by 40 feet)
and that the building is 80 feet wide and 160 feet long (and thus compatible with the
workcenter dimensions). We find that all material is transported in a standard- size crate
by forklift truck, one crate to a truck (which constitutes one “load”). Now suppose that
transportation costs are $1 to move a load between adjacent workcenters and $1 extra for
each workcenter in between.
 The expected loads between workcenters and the available space is depicted for the first year of
operation are given below:
Design of Process Layout
Based on the above information, interworkcenter flow by a model
Design of Process Layout
The second step is to determine the cost of this layout by multiplying the material
handling cost by the number of loads moved between each pair of workcenters
Design of Process Layout
A popular heuristic for the assignment problem forms the basis for the computerized
procedure known as computerized relative allocation of facilities (CRAFT).
Automated layout design programme (ALDEP), Computerized relationship layout
planning (CORELAP), and plant layout evaluation techniques (PLANET) are three
known software packages that utilize construction logic