Interrelations among SMED Stages: A Causal Model

Abstract

Mexico has received a lot of foreign investment that has brought in a wide range of novel production philosophies, such as Single Minute Exchange of Dies (SMED). Despite its popularity and reported effectiveness, Mexican companies often quit SMED implementation as they consider it challenging. This usually happens when organizations are not familiarized enough with each one of the SMED stages or do not know how they are interrelated. In this article the interrelations among the different SMED implementation stages by means of a structural equations model are analyzed. Data for constructing the model were gathered from a survey administered to 250 employees from the Mexican maquiladora industry. The survey assessed the importance of 14 activities belonging to the four SMED stages. The descriptive analyses of these stages were conducted and integrated into a structural equations model as latent variables, to find their level of dependency. The model was constructed using WarpPLS 5 software, and direct, indirect, and total effects among variables are analyzed and validated. Results from the model revealed that Stage 1 of SMED implementation, known as the Identification Stage, has both direct and indirect effects on all the other SMED stages, being the most important stage.

Implementation of the Single Minute Exchange of Dies method for reducing changeover time in a hygiene production company

“…It is recommended to capture the actions performed by the machine operator and the steps or the operations performed by the machine during the changeover. Usually, the actual optimization involves the actions performed by the operator [34]. It is also recommended to record the changeover without making any comments in order to capture the actual performance of the changeover.…”

“…During the third step, the effort should be made to transform internal changeover processes into external ones. At the same time, each change should be carefully examined in regard to costs and labor needed for the change to be implemented, balanced against the benefits the time-saving the change will bring [34]. Each element within the changeover procedure should be looked at, and the most promising elements should be prioritized.…”

Lean Manufacturing Tools Applied to Material Flow and Their Impact on Economic Sustainability

“…SMED is a response to the need to reduce production batches' size and looks to switch quickly from one product to another [49]. Traditionally, manufacturers prefer to assemble large quantities and prorate the setup cost over a high number of units.…”

Effects of Human Factors and Lean Techniques on Just in Time Benefits

“…The model illustrated in Figure 1 is tested using the structural equations modeling (SEM) technique based on partial least squares (PLS) and integrated in WarpPLS 6 ® software program, which is recommended for ordinal, non-normal data and small samples [65], and similar research has been performed using these techniques, such as, for example, Díaz-Reza, et al [66], who related the SMED stages to the benefits gained, and Boon Sin, et al [67], who reported the relationship between knowledge management and six sigma success. The indices and parameters for model validation were obtained with a 95% confidence level.…”