History and Benefits of the Assembly Line

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

Assembly lines are manufacturing processes which are of great importance in the industrial production of high quantity and even low volume production of customized products. In an assembly line, two or more different tasks are fitted together in a sequential manner to form a new finished product. An assembly line is a flow-oriented production system, where the operations on the workpieces are performed in the designed stations. The workpieces are moved along the stations in a line usually by some kind of transportation system, for example a conveyor belt, transfer lines or cranes. Henry Ford, the founder of the Ford Motor Company, is the father of modern assembly lines by introducing the use of assembly lines. This revolutionary assembly line was for the mass production of the Model-T automobile in 1908–1915 (Uddin et al., 2011).

Assembly lines were basically introduced and designed for a cost-efficient mass production of standardized products, also exploiting a high specialization of labour. In modern manufacturing system however, product requirements and its production systems have changed dramatically, mainly because of customer needs. Manufacturing companies have to allow for an individualization of their products, come up with more complex manufacturing strategies and assembly systems (Uddin et al., 2011). Designing and configuring assembly lines in modern era requires high capital investments, thus has attracted the attention of researchers, to solve assembly lines’ problem and optimize its efficiency in terms of productivity and cost (Boysen et al., 2006).

1.1 Background of the Study

There are many types of assembly line that are being designed and implemented in modern manufacturing. The designs of...

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...inal assembly line and final inspection (Figure 3.2). The final assembly line of the commercial vehicle section is typically divided into two separate lines: 1) cabin trim line, 2) chassis assembly line. This project only focuses on level of balance in the cabin trim line.

Figure 3.2: Major departments in truck ‘Model MF’ productions.

3.2.1 Cabin Trim Line Process Flow and Layout

Following figure shows the detailed processes for the cabin trim line of ‘Model MF’. The designed layout for this line is the type of in-line layout for a single model. The total manpower used to assemble parts and accomplish the work elements at the workstation is 10. This project does not consider the other manpower and processes other than in T1 to T9, inspections or sub-assemblies. Sub-assemblies are done off-line to reduce the total work content time on the cabin trim assembly line.