Dec 7 2022
During the Van-of-Nerds Tour de France, in 9/22, one of our hosts said, “It’s one thing to collect data, but it’s another to make simple and usable summaries for people.” Some of the visualizations we saw at several sites, however, showed that our hosts underestimate what it takes to generate “simple and usable summaries.”
Dec 4 2022
The software and hardware systems used in manufacturing fall under Information Technology (IT) if they only interact with humans, and Operational Technology (OT) if they also interact with machines and facilities. Industry 4.0 is mostly OT, but manufacturing has traditionally focused more on IT.
IT produces reports on delivery performance; OT issues alarms when a gas pipe springs a leak. The distinction is sharp between extreme cases but blurry where the two meet. In principle, all the systems should form a functional stack, with each layer activating and exchanging data with the layer below. The top layer supports management decisions, and the bottom layer interacts with operators and machines. In reality, it does not often work as it should. The key to making it work is continuous improvement/Kaizen, with technology retrofits, rather than a radical “digital transformation.”
Dec 1 2022
Some hosts showed digital twins during the Van of Nerds tour de France last September, but none mentioned the cyber-physical systems touted as a key component in Industry 4.0. Furthermore, we also found that the meaning of digital twin had drifted away from detailed simulations of physics and chemistry as part of a cyber-physical system for process control.
Instead, a digital twin is now an animation of part movements and machine status in a line for production control. This has effectively disabled discussions of digital twins in the context of cyber-physical systems, which matters in stabilizing and establishing capability for high-technology processes like additive manufacturing.
Nov 22 2022
This is the perspective of Cécile Roche about what we saw in the Van-of-Nerds tour in September, 2022:
The risk when we talk about digital, even more than when we talk about Lean, is to worry about processes before worrying about products. We must never forget that a process is never an end in itself. It is at the service of creating value for customers — in other words, products — and at the service of improving people’s working conditions — making the work easier and improving its quality. Lean practices are not implemented to produce faster. They are implemented to reveal problems as soon as possible, in order to take care of the customers by taking care of the products, and for that, make people grow in autonomy by developing their capacity for problem solving and then increase productivity through quality.
Nov 12 2022
This is the first in a series of posts about learnings from the Van of Nerds tour of 11 manufacturing sites in Northern France completed on September 9. First, I describe who we are, why and how we went on this tour. Then, to make this post more than just an introduction, I appended a summary of our observations on automation and people. There is more to come.
Dec 11 2022
About Introduction to Manufacturing
In a personal exchange, François Pellerin described our Introduction to Manufacturing as a “reference book,” which makes it sound like one of those thick tomes you put on a shelf and never open: a dictionary, an encyclopedia, or a handbook.
This is 180º from our intention. We wrote it as a textbook for students of industrial engineering and operations management that working professionals can also use.
We hope to see it on desks, dog-eared, highlighted, annotated, and coffee-stained. If not in print, then in the same condition in the reader’s e-book library.
Continue reading…
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By Michel Baudin • Book reviews • 2 • Tags: Manufacturing, Textbook