Sometimes, rather than being a Jack-of-all-trades, it is best to hand over the baton to be more efficient. Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) is one of the most common terms one can hear in any industry. Manufacturers know how important OEE is for their industry’s growth but not everyone knows how to improve it efficiently.
In this blog, we will review where manufacturers can improve to see significant results.
The three major aspects of OEE are availability, performance, and quality. Improving these factors can improve your OEE as well as your production capacity and your profits.
Improving the OEE Variables by Reducing Losses
Availability: This variable represents a machine’s actual run time vs its planned run time. Availability loss is calculated based on equipment downtime throughout the factory. This is one of the major aspects industries can improve. Improvement in availability is carried out via various steps.
Performance: This variable reflects the factory’s performance by the production speed. It is estimated by comparing the actual throughput during run time to the maximum possible throughput. The performance loss is the time lost when machines are not running at their maximum designed speed. Mostly, this can occur because machines run slowly. Fixing slow-running machines and achieving optimal production speed has a direct effect on OEE. Here is how you can improve performance.
Quality: This variable is a ratio between good products produced and the total units produced. The quality loss is mostly waste and scrap (products that don’t meet the quality requirements). A decrease in the scrap and wastage of the product improves the production quantity along with quality, which improves your OEE. Here is how to improve your quality score.
The Importance of Real-Time Knowledge
Automated data collection and processing: Automated data collection and processing leaves no room for error and allows for more information. Insufficient data collection is a primary barrier to achieving higher levels of productivity and improved OEE. By automating this process, you collect all needed data, your KPIs are 100% accurate at all times and it requires no labor time, which saves a lot of money but also leaves more time for workers to improve the three variables we just discussed. Implementing a real-time production monitoring system such as Clariprod [2], will improve your OEE just by being installed and collecting your data.
This also allows you to connect your machine data to any other data source, such as an ERP, giving you even more information on how to improve the overall process in your plant, which will also impact your OEE.
Real-time information leads to immediate actions: Real-time information helps industries track equipment and plant performance. Real-time data collection and information from performance reports and analysis allows management to take immediate corrective actions when problems arise, preventing major machine breakdowns, production bottlenecks, and idling machines. It gives the exact reason and location of the problem, which speeds up the repair process. It allows workers to focus on the affected sections.
In addition, real-time data visualization on a dashboard provides an instant overview of the plant, with the performance of every machine on the shop floor. Visualization of data, like OEE, increases your ability to comprehend complex data because, in visual form, we process information faster. This visual representation of data allows you to see, in an instant, where to focus your energy to maximize your OEE. Then, the information in your performance report lets you know what actions to take.
Knowing what’s going on in your plant at all times and automating data collection as well as performance reporting will have a huge impact on your OEE.
Real-time production monitoring, automated data collection, and immediate maintenance form the right environment for the improvement of availability, performance, and quality of the production. These all work in accordance to ensure optimized and improved OEE. Improved OEE, in turn, confirms increased production quantity, quality, and profits for manufacturers. All this makes improving OEE an inseparable dimension of the manufacturing industry to ensure continuous growth.