Exam 5: Constraint Management

Which one of the following statements about line balancing is best?

The production of a particular product consists of the following work elements. If the cycle time is 4 minutes and the work-element times are as follows, what is the theoretical minimum number of stations?

The third step in Theory of Constraints application, "subordinate all other decisions to Step 2," means that the analyst should:

How can Theory of Constraints principles be reconciled with line balancing?

Figure 5.2 The figure above shows the process for customers arriving at Pierre's Spa and Salon. After signing in, customers are routed to different locations in the Spa for the two different services provided. The numbers in parentheses are the time in minutes for each step of the process. -Use the information in Figure 5.2. What is the throughput time for the A-B-E-F-G-H routing?

Table 5.2 A company makes four products that have the following characteristics: Product A sells for $75 but needs $20 of materials and $20 of labor to produce; Product B sells for $90 but needs $45 of materials and $20 of labor to produce; Product C sells for $110 but needs $50 of materials and $30 of labor to produce; Product D sells for $135 but needs $75 of materials and $40 of labor to produce. The processing requirements for each product on each of the four machines are shown in the table. Work centers W, X, Y, and Z are available for 40 hours per week and have no setup time when switching between products. Market demand is 50 As, 60 Bs, 70 Cs, and 80 Ds per week. In the questions that follow, the traditional method refers to maximizing the contribution margin per unit for each product, and the bottleneck method refers to maximizing the contribution margin per minute at the bottleneck for each product. -Use the information in Table 5.2. Using the traditional method, what is the optimal product mix?

Table 5.2 A company makes four products that have the following characteristics: Product A sells for $75 but needs $20 of materials and $20 of labor to produce; Product B sells for $90 but needs $45 of materials and $20 of labor to produce; Product C sells for $110 but needs $50 of materials and $30 of labor to produce; Product D sells for $135 but needs $75 of materials and $40 of labor to produce. The processing requirements for each product on each of the four machines are shown in the table. Work centers W, X, Y, and Z are available for 40 hours per week and have no setup time when switching between products. Market demand is 50 As, 60 Bs, 70 Cs, and 80 Ds per week. In the questions that follow, the traditional method refers to maximizing the contribution margin per unit for each product, and the bottleneck method refers to maximizing the contribution margin per minute at the bottleneck for each product. -Use the information in Table 5.2. Using the bottleneck method, what is the optimal product mix?

Table 5.2 A company makes four products that have the following characteristics: Product A sells for $75 but needs $20 of materials and $20 of labor to produce; Product B sells for $90 but needs $45 of materials and $20 of labor to produce; Product C sells for $110 but needs $50 of materials and $30 of labor to produce; Product D sells for $135 but needs $75 of materials and $40 of labor to produce. The processing requirements for each product on each of the four machines are shown in the table. Work centers W, X, Y, and Z are available for 40 hours per week and have no setup time when switching between products. Market demand is 50 As, 60 Bs, 70 Cs, and 80 Ds per week. In the questions that follow, the traditional method refers to maximizing the contribution margin per unit for each product, and the bottleneck method refers to maximizing the contribution margin per minute at the bottleneck for each product. -Use the information in Table 5.2. Using the bottleneck method, which product should be scheduled first?

Any factor that limits the performance of a system and restricts its output is a(n) ________.

Describe three ways that line balancing and line flow layouts are similar to project management and three ways that they are different from project management.

Schmidt Industries makes four different snake traps; the Harlan, the Gaylen, the Leah and the Matthew. The Harlan sells for $200 and has $40 in parts and $40 in labor; the Gaylen sells for $150 and requires $30 in parts and $30 in labor; the Leah sells for $100 and has $20 in parts and $20 in labor; and the Matthew sells for $75 but requires only $10 of parts and $10 of labor. Schmidt Industries has four machines (we'll call them A, B, C, and D for convenience) that are used in the production of each of these products. Each of these machines is available for 40 hours a week and there is no setup time required when shifting from the production of one product to any other. The processing requirements to make one unit of each product are shown in the table. Schmidt Industries has monthly fixed costs of $5,000 and has a demand forecast of 80 Harlans, 60 Gaylens, 40 Leahs and 20 Matthews for the coming month. How many of each of the four models should Susan, the operations manager, schedule for production this month?

Table 5.4 The Superior Management Company assembles muffalettas in The Big Easy. The steps to making a world class sandwich and the time required (in seconds) for each step are shown in the table. -Customers demand muffalettas at the rate of 20 sandwiches per hour. Use the information in Table 5.4 to determine the cycle time that will meet this level of demand.

The process batch at the constraint in a drum-buffer-rope system should be:

Table 5.2 A company makes four products that have the following characteristics: Product A sells for $75 but needs $20 of materials and $20 of labor to produce; Product B sells for $90 but needs $45 of materials and $20 of labor to produce; Product C sells for $110 but needs $50 of materials and $30 of labor to produce; Product D sells for $135 but needs $75 of materials and $40 of labor to produce. The processing requirements for each product on each of the four machines are shown in the table. Work centers W, X, Y, and Z are available for 40 hours per week and have no setup time when switching between products. Market demand is 50 As, 60 Bs, 70 Cs, and 80 Ds per week. In the questions that follow, the traditional method refers to maximizing the contribution margin per unit for each product, and the bottleneck method refers to maximizing the contribution margin per minute at the bottleneck for each product. -Use the information in Table 5.2. Using the bottleneck method, in what sequence should products be scheduled for production?

You have been assigned a line balancing task and given a list of tasks, their precedence requirements, and the time needed to accomplish them. As you begin to balance the line, you realize that you must make some assumptions. What are these assumptions and which of them has the greatest impact on the success of your balance?

Use the process flow diagram to determine which of these events has the greatest net benefit.

Line balancing applies only to line processes that do assembly work, or to work that can be bundled in many ways to create the jobs for each workstation in the line.

A competent operations manager should first eliminate all of the bottlenecks from the process.

Line balancing is the assignment of work to stations in a line to achieve the desired output rate with the smallest number of workstations.

Which statement about process batches is best?