Cutting It Close

As an international manufacturer of riding mowers and other turf care equipment and member of the Electrolux Group, Husqvarna Turf Care faced serious production challenges in its Beatrice, Nebraska, facility. As the result of a planned facility rationalization and an acquisition, an additional product line to support manufacture of its Consumer Zero Turn Radius Lawn Mower needed to be integrated into the apparently full facility. The consolidation needed to take place during the early spring seasonal peak when its dealers, distributors and large national retailers stock-up for the spring rush. Compounding the problem was that the plant was also losing profitable business in service parts due to production constraints limiting its ability to build and ship parts on time.

How to Get Lean
Facing these issues, the executive management team was convinced that Lean Manufacturing techniques offered the solution to these problems. But, as leading industry analysts are finding in recent benchmarking and market studies, the team also knew it couldn't embark on a long "lean journey", nor could they afford the operational disruption usually associated with manufacturing transformation and major systems implementations.

Seeking a solution that would support the implementation of demand-driven Kanban replenishment techniques, lean scheduling and line balancing, Husqvarna selected Pelion Systems to lead its manufacturing transformation efforts. A major factor in this decision was Pelion's sophisticated manufacturing process optimization (Pelion MPO) software that allows manufacturers to quickly implement demand-driven principles to achieve and sustain manufacturing excellence.
Using a unique process model-based software design, Pelion Systems enabled Husqvarna to apply lean principles while taking advantage of lean technology to accelerate its transformation without disrupting its operations. This was critical during a peak seasonal demand period.

The Optimal Amount
Pelion had already had completed some successful projects with one of Husqvarna's sister plants. By modeling the Husqvarna "as is" operations using the Process Optimizer module of the Pelion MPO software, Husqvarna manufacturing personnel applied the sophisticated calculations required to determine the optimal quantities and flow for its Kanban system and assisted in developing a balanced line design.

By using current operations as the basis for implementing the software, Husqvarna implemented lean strategies to manage daily operations more efficiently and without disruption.

According to Richard Moon, vice president, Operations, Husqvarna Turf Care, the company originally wanted to implement Kanban and realize a 10 percent reduction in work in process (WIP) inventory. To do so, it wanted to evaluate the line design of two of the highest volume lines and expand capacity by 25 percent with very little additional floor space. Using the Pelion MPO, Husqvarna was able to implement a new mixed model production line that incorporated the additional products, yet still resulted in a floor space savings of 12 percent.

The products that were combined on one assembly line were the Dethatchers, Aerators and Stump Grinders. These three types of units have approximately 40 different variations and share only nuts and bolts as common parts. The biggest challenge to overcome was to get the right parts to the line at the right time with very little change required over time. Simultaneously, by implementing the Factory Manager module to schedule daily operations, cycle time was slashed by 50 percent and productivity improved by 10 percent.

The Prior Process
Prior to implementing the Pelion MPO solution, the peak daily rates would have taken 15 people per day, but after the improvements they were able to achieve those same rates with 12 people.

The Pelion MPO visualization capabilities and ability to model "to be" scenarios and processes enabled Husqvarna to determine that with the lines not being balanced and each product having its own assembly line that people were not fully utilized. Husqvarna also found the design capabilities useful in developing the layout and design of a new facility being built across the street from its current capacity constrained facility.

The Benefits Emerge
As a by-product of these operational improvements, on-time shipping performance for service parts improved from 50 percent to 95 percent."Our customers have noticed a difference in service parts delivery performance," says Moon. "It is usually one of the first things that they talk about."

The Pelion software offers additional improvement capabilities as well, especially extending the Kanban replenishment system electronically via a Web portal to include its suppliers for supplier Kanban (Pelion MPO Supply Manager). By linking the production of component parts to actual demand and using Pelion MPO's capability to provide electronic replenishment signals to suppliers, work in progress (WIP) inventory was able to be reduced by more than 20 percent.
The next step for Husqvarna will be to fully implement the supplier Kanban capabilities to continue to extend the Kanban chain to all of our suppliers. Adds Moon, "we have begun test programs with great results."