PRODUCTIVITY IMPROVEMENT AT A MANUFACTURING WORKSTATION THROUGH APPLICATION OF ERGONOMIC PRINCIPLES

摘要

An appliance manufacturer reported lack of productivity at a consumer freezer assembly line. The procedure of connecting tube while fixing the screws and turning the shell of the product on a repeated basis required continuous body movement along with high pressure to be applied by the operator. The goal of this project was to observe and evaluate instances of human machine interface which may result into significant stress on the shoulder and lower back and thereby improve the productivity of the workstation. Time study and ergonomic evaluation was conducted to find the frequency of each freezer being turned and to measure stress. Few alternative approaches were designed and recommended to the company. One of the suggestions required addition of an operator to lift the shell while another approach recommended application of job rotation principle. Results of this project and a discussion of a cost-effective approach to solve the problem are presented in this paper.