Topic 1

1. a
2. b
3. b
4. b
5. a

Topic 2

1. c
2. c
3. a
4. c
5. b
6. b
7. c
8. c
9. d
10. c
11. c
12. a
13. c
14. c
15. b
16. c
17. c
18. d

Topic 3

1. b
2. b
3. b
4. c
5. a
6. a
7. c
8. a
9. b
10. b
11. a
12. b
13. a
14. b
15. d
 Topic 4

1. a
2. b
3. a
4. c

Topic 5

1. b
2. b
3. a
4. a
5. b
6. c
Topic 1: Manufacturing Systems

A manufacturing system is a transformation system that transforms raw material into

finished products that have value in the market place. The functions in a
manufacturing system are product design, manufacturing planning, manufacturing
control, business, administration, production and testing. There are 3 basic types of
production namely, job shop production, batch production and mass production.
There are 4 type of plant layout namely, fixed position layout, process-based layout,
product-flow layout and flexible manufacturing systems layout. The USA principle
can be applied in an automation project to understand, simplify and automate the
process.

Topic 2: Manufacturing Concepts and Performance Indicators

Manufacturing lead time (MLT) is the total time required to process a product through
the plant. Production rate of a manufacturing process is the maximum output per unit
time. Plant capacity is the maximum rate of output that the plant is able to produce
under a given set of operating conditions over a given period of time. Plant utilization
rate refers to the ratio between the actual output of a plant and its capacity. Work-In-
Progress (WIP) refers to the amount of product located in the plant that is either being
process or is waiting between processing operations. The magnitude of WIP can be
measured by the WIP ratio and TIP ratio.

Topic 3: Manufacturing Economics

Direct costs are costs of material and labour that are easily measured and allocated to
a specific operation, product or project. Indirect costs are costs that are related to
operations and products. They include material handing, work scheduling and
supervision. Overhead costs consist of all the costs during manufacturing other than
direct material and labour costs. The 3 basic concepts of time value of money are
future value, single sum present value and uniform series present worth. Standard
costing method refers to the standardization rates to quantities for material, labour and
overhead for a job. Break-even analysis assesses the effect of changes in
manufacturing systems on cost, revenues and profits. Unit cost of production
decreases when batch sizes increases. Cost of equipment is the sum of capital and
operating cost.

Topic 4: Process-based Facility Layout

Correct selection of plant layout, high quality system design and implementation
process are strategies to design an efficient manufacturing system. In process-based
layout, the consideration is generally associated with versatile operations that must
provide non-standard products. The advantages of process-based layout are flexibility,
non-duplication, expertise and high variety of products. The disadvantages are lower
material handing efficiency, complications in PPC and low productivity compared to
flow-line layout. The 3 techniques for process-based layout are dominated flow
pattern, directly specified closeness preferences and Cost-Volume-Distance (CVD)
Model.
Topic 5: Flow-Lines and Assembly Systems

The components of flow-lines include work transport, breakdown buffers, variation

cycle times between workstations buffers, control functions and automation for
machining operations. The advantages of flow-line layout are reduction in material
handling, lower MLT, lower WIP, lower tooling cost, high manufacturing efficiency,
simplified and faster worker training. The disadvantages are large investment, lower
adaptation flexibility, work monotony, performance dependency and production rate
determined by slowest workstation in flow line. Precedence diagram, largest-
candidate rule and the Kilbridge and Wester’s method are used to balanced line
problem. The 2 breakdown analysis techniques are upper bound approach and lower
bound approach. Storage buffers can be used to increase line efficiency. Thus when
one of the workstations breaks down, the buffer prevents other workstations from
being immediately affected.

Topic 6: Cellular Manufacturing

Group technology is an effective technique in solving many problems faced in

discrete batch manufacturing. The 3 general techniques of group technology are visual
inspection, production flow analysis and classification and coding systems. Visual
inspection being the cheapest is suitable for small company having smaller number of
parts. Production flow analysis uses the manufacturing sequence as a basis for
grouping parts into families. Classification and coding is the most-consuming and
complicated methods. The classification is categories into design, manufacturing and
a combination of design and manufacturing attributes. Cellular manufacturing systems
(CMS) is a relatively new layout that combines the flexibility of workshop layout and
the efficiency of flowline layout. The 2 methods of cell formation based on
production flow analysis are visual inspection and single linkage cluster analysis. The
advantages of CMS is to reduced setup times, reduced WIP, higher equipment
utilization, simplified shopfloor control and improved teamwork.

Topic 7: Scheduling and JIT Manufacturing

Objectives of scheduling and control are to meet customer delivery dates and
minimize costs. The planning and cost estimation is done on route sheet or operations
sheet. Scheduling consists of 2 tasks, loading and sequencing. JIT concept originates
from Toyota aims to reduce costs by eliminating wastages, achieve product quality,
creating high adaptive worksites and organizing work sites based on teamwork. The
JIT concept are divided into 3 groups, namely people involvement, total quality
management and JIT flow. Benefits of JIT removed functional boundaries within an
organization. Barriers of JIT includes frequent changes in production planning,
inaccurate forecasting, poor equipment, lack of expertise and cooperation.

Topic 8: Lean Production and Agile Manufacturing

Trends in manufacturing based on JIT product, uses a wide range of computerized and
automation in manufacturing to reduce product life cycles. Lean production strives for
perfect first-time quality and continuous improvement. Agile manufacturing focus on
managing agility versus mass production. Social and economic impacts is counteract
by retraining and educating labours to meet higher efficient job.