Following up projects in France, Germany and the Czech Republic: with Behr in the USA

Behr produces 65-mm evaporators in its largest US plant in Dayton, Ohio. The facility’s output goal is to produce 4,800 units per day. However, time and again problems associated with technical and management issues hampered the production process. Agamus Consult, a Behr partner of long standing, was tasked to stabilize the production process in a period of just three months.

A thorough four-week analysis conducted by a joint task force identified the true causes of the stabilization problem. It was imperative to pinpoint precisely the disruptive factors and effects in order to select and implement the appropriate measures within three months and bring about immediately perceptible improvements.

Two key cornerstones for process stabilization efforts were singled out –
to visualize process steps / standard operating procedures and motivate the employees.

Process steps were visualized using a new format tailored to suit the cultural environment. This new view affords every employee in-depth insight into the entire production process at a glance. The new operating procedures convey all the key aspects of processes pertaining to all the relevant departments, that is, Production, Engineering, Quality and Maintenance.

The participation of production personnel in all phases of the project, in particular during the process analysis, considerably enhanced their motivation and capacity for teamwork. This, in turn, fostered far better communication between Engineering and Production.

In just a few weeks time, the project began to yield initial successes: Daily output increased by 20 percent. Downtime - including the micro disruption that this entails – decreased markedly.

The achievements in Dayton raised eyebrows at Behr in Charleston. Consequently, Agamus was tasked to not only to stabilize processes, but also to design ideal layouts for production cells.

Again, the initiative kicked off with an in-depth analysis conducted jointly with Behr colleagues. In the course of the ensuing nine-week project, the team stabilized the core builder process, developed a new layout for the final assembly cells, and introduced a process visualization system with the Dayton model serving as a template.

A newly designed tool called the Project Control Chart enables both Agamus and Behr to very efficiently ascertain the effects of all implemented measures.

The efforts were rewarded with success within a few weeks: The daily output of the block assembler selected for the project increased by some 50 percent, and setup times were be reduced by about 55 percent.

This project showed again, production personnel’s participation in an interdisciplinary team is vital to achieving success. 

Héctor Castillo Libby, Agamus Consult