Medical Manfacturing Without the Manual: At Lowell Inc., advanced machine-tool technology virtually eliminates the need for manual operations

摘要

Lowell Inc., a medical contract manufacturer in Minneapolis, sometimes ignores part machining cycle times, and instead focuses its attention on overall throughput speed. In its current state, the shop could immediately reduce several of its machining cycle times by half, but doing so would add significant amounts of manual processing to the equation. The 78-person shop always strives to economize its use of skilled labor. Whenever possible, it avoids having one person stationed at a single machine - trying to keep pace with it while also racing to perform the subsequent manual operations such as deburring and in-process inspection. This slows overall throughput. So instead, Lowell incorporates advanced machine-tool technology that provides complete part-processing capability to basically eliminate the need for manual operations. This frees machinists to tend multiple machines, making those individuals even more productive.