Inventory control through a CONWIP pull production system
Author(s)
Liu, Jean Jingying
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Alternative title
Inventory control through a constant work-in-process pull production system
Other Contributors
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Mechanical Engineering.
Advisor
Stephen C. Graves.
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Production systems such as the CONWIP (constant work-in-process) pull production system have been widely studied by researchers to date. The CONWIP pull production system is an alternative to pure push and pure pull systems that lowers and controls inventory levels and reduces production lead time. In this study, a CONWIP pull production system was simulated in place of the current push production system at a food packaging company. ARENA 12.0 simulation software was used and a production system with two dedicated production lines was proposed to reduce the current system's complexity. A method for obtaining the optimum CONWIP level was determined. Various advantages of the CONWIP pull production system were analyzed and it was found that besides a reduction in planning complexity, the proposed two dedicated lines with CONWIP pull production system can also help the company to greatly reduce their total WIP and achieve inventory holding costs savings of over S$38,000 per month. In addition, the total customer lead time can also be reduced from 12 days to 10 days while still meeting customer demand.
Description
Thesis (M. Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2010. Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. Includes bibliographical references (p. 83-84).
Date issued
2010Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical EngineeringPublisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Keywords
Mechanical Engineering.