Aquatica makes underwater camera housings for divers. The process begins with a solid rectangular block of aluminum

When preparing for your response to the activity, it is recommended that you read it several times.

• Read it the first time to familiarize yourself with the scenario.
• On the second reading, consider your assigned role in the situation, and let that guide your perspective. Look deeper at the details: facts, problems, organizational goals, objectives, policies, strategies.
• Next, consider the concepts, theories, tools, and research you need to use to address the issues presented.
• Then, complete any research, analysis, calculations, or graphing to support your decisions and make recommendations.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

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This assignment focuses on the setup time portion of a process. While not all processes have setup times, those that do require careful analysis. Setup time takes away from an organization’s production rate (or throughput). The goal of this activity is to allow you to select and justify your selection of a setup time process strategy.

This activity addresses the following Module Outcome:

• Assess multistep processes utilizing a variety of parameters such as bottleneck, capacity, utilization, flow rate, rework, and cycle time. (CO#1, CO#4)

PROMPT

Aquatica makes underwater camera housings for divers. The process begins with a solid rectangular block of aluminum, which is used to make a single housing. A Computer Numerically Controlled (CNC) machine drills into the block to make the metal “frame” of the housing. Each block requires 15 minutes of drilling. The frame is then chemically treated in a series of baths. There is ample capacity in the treating stage. Finally, a worker must manually attach the various buttons and components to the metal housing. This assembly takes 120 minutes per housing per worker and Aquatica has 6 workers trained to do this task. The CNC machine requires a 30-minute setup time before the production of a batch can begin.

Aquatica actually makes 5 different housings. As already mentioned, the CNC machine must be setup whenever production switches from one housing to the other. In each case the setup time is 30 minutes and it takes 15 minutes to drill the block for each type of housing. Demands for the housings are given in the table below.

Demands for Housing

TASKS

In a memo to the Process Improvement Officer, complete the following:

1. Aquatica’sProcess Improvement Officer has recommended reducing the variety of housing types.
   1. If you remove two varieties, what is the revised utilization (as a percentage)?
   2. Select four (4) different combinations of varieties to analyze (so for each combination you will remove two (2) housing types and recalculate the utilization (as a percentage)). Report results in a table format.
2. Create a graph of Variety versus Utilization for the four combinations you have selected.
3. Which combination (with two housing types removed) has the highest utilization?
4. Could you have determined this (which combination would have the highest utilization) without doing calculations? If so, how?
5. What additional supply chain strategies could you utilize to improve Aquatica’sability to serve its customers? And why?
6. Cachon and Terwiesch (2017) stated, “The advantage of a fast processing time can outweigh the disadvantage of the setup” (p. 194). Explain this concept utilizing Aquatica’sprocess as an example.

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