Lean Manufacturing

In this activity, students will explore how lean manufacturing can apply to the assembly process in a simulated airplane assembly plant.

Students will identify the process wastes and provide solutions to improve. Through multiple iterations, students will collect data about the number of planes produced and if they met customer demand as well as production time and amount of work in progress items.

Learning Objectives

Standards Alignments + Connections

Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills

Principles of Manufacturing

PRINMAN.2.A: Demonstrate communication techniques consistent with industry standards

PRINMAN.7.A: Investigate an area of interest in manufacturing

PRINMAN.7.B: Analyze the various specializations in manufacturing

Diversified Manufacturing I

DIMANU1.1.B: Interpret engineering drawings, charts, diagrams, and welding symbols

DIMANU1.6.A: Participate in the manufacturing of a mass produced project

DIMANU1.6.B: Develop a method to check and maintain quality control throughout the manufacturing process

DIMANU1.7.B: Determine the most effective strategies to minimize costs.

DIMANU1.9.A: Demonstrate communication techniques consistent with industry standards.

Precision Metal Manufacturing I

PREMMAN2.1.G: Evaluate systems and operations; identify causes, problems, patterns, or issues; and explore workable solutions or remedies to improve situations

Practicum in Manufacturing

PRACMAN.2.C Demonstrate teamwork processes such as promoting team building, consensus, continuous improvement, respect for the opinions of others, cooperation, adaptability, and conflict resolution

Activity Components

Pre-Laboratory Engagement

Students can begin to think about time wastes and how organization decreases that waste with a 5S activity.

5S Numbers Game by St. Andrews Lean

O’Peep’s 5S Game by eLearning Factory

Activity

In this activity, students will have the opportunity to see assembly line processes in live time and see hands-on how small changes to the process can vastly improve production.

This activity can be used to present advanced manufacturing concepts or to introduce the concept of change as a positive force. Throughout the activity, students will compare cellular manufacturing, pull/push systems, batch size, work in progress as a manageable asset, inventory risks, independent cross training, and the effects of rapid throughput with traditional manufacturing.

This activity dramatically demonstrates the advantages of advanced production techniques over traditional production methods still practiced by many companies today. The activity consists of four different phases. By working through the four basic phases, students quickly understand the dynamics necessary to maximize throughput, minimize losses, and minimize inventory.

Utilizing a hands-on approach, students operate workstations (WS) along the assembly line in a fictional aircraft plant. For simplicity, the actual construction materials and components are represented with Lego blocks. Labor skills, deadlines, quality control and other real-life situations have been incorporated into each phase of the simulation. Each phase of the simulation runs approximately 6 minutes.

Post-Laboratory Extension

Students can further explore lean and how to best solve problems related to bottlenecks with another simulated manufacturing experience.

The Bottleneck Game

Additional Resources

Understanding Lean Manufacturing (Kaizen.com)

This guide introduces lean manufacturing as an organization-wide philosophy aimed at continuously improving processes, products, and services by identifying and eliminating waste.

Lean Thinking and Methods- 5S (US EPA)

The EPA explains 5S as a cyclical methodology—Sort, Set in Order, Shine, Standardize, Sustain—that organizes and maintains a clean, efficient workplace to enable continuous improvement.

Lean Simulations (LeanSimulations.org)

This post presents a wide-ranging, free catalog of lean simulation games—ranging from dice-rolling workflows to paper-airplane factories—designed to make lean principles interactive and engaging.

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