Aggreko and Cameron House Hotel

The Company:

Aggreko Manufacturing in Dumbarton manufacture Temporary Power & Temperature Control equipment for hire around the globe. The highest volume and highest revenue products manufactured are a range of temporary power generators. The units at the top of this range, the 1MW variants (One Mega Watt variants), range from 800kVA to 1.2MW in output and account for around 50% of the revenue from the plant.

The Challenge/Issues

The success of Aggreko in the market place had created a need to be able to produce nearly 30% more throughput in less space while simultaneously maximising line side delivery to improve predictability and further reduce costs.

They also wanted to take this opportunity to maximise line side delivery to improve predictability and further reduce costs.

How Ross International helped

Ross International proposed facilitating a multi-level, multi-functional team of people through a 1-week Kaizen Blitz. Meetings were held with the MD, Tom Sreeves, and members of his management team to fix the scope, set the goals and choose the team necessary to do the job.

The scope included all processes from material delivery to the build area, build, test, final inspection and shipment of the finished product.

The goals set, reflected the challenge with the main objective being the capability to produce 30% more product in the same space at less cost without any effect on quality at test or with the customer.

Pre-meetings were held with the Kaizen Team and with all operators and others likely to be affected by the new processes, to invite their co-operation and assistance.

We facilitated a Kaizen Blitz week followed the usual Ross International pattern with training on Day-1, establishing the current state on Day-2, designing and developing the new ways on Day-3, testing and getting feedback and continuously improving on Day-4 and finished with pulling together an action plan and making a presentation on Day-5.

Follow-through visits took place to ensure the action plan was being worked and that any obstacles to progress were being elevated for attention as required.

Impact

A flow process for the build was established with 3 progressive stages each capable of operating within the Takt Time for the new volumes of units in half the build space.

The new process made it easier to focus on the details within each of the 3 sub-stages and identify further areas for reduction of the hands-on time required to build the units. Line balancing carried out after the Kaizen led to a 36% reduction in build labour hours.

Material supply to the build process

Once the locations for the build process had been fixed, we devised a system for supplying material to the position line-side where it was used. This eliminated the need to produce kits of material for each generator. The receiving yard was completely re-laid to allow the heavy, frequently used parts for the 1MW variants to be delivered as close as possible to the build area.

Test Yard

The test yard was completely reorganised during the week to minimise congestion and double/triple handling of generator sets. Now, instead of fuelling of units being done with the units sitting in the wash bay, the fuelling is done in a dedicated fuelling area and not moved to the test area until they are completely ready for test. This, together with the reduced movements required, increased the test capacity to cope with the new volumes without the need to buy additional capital equipment (load banks). The test yard is now much cleaner, tidier and safer for all users.

Further Outcomes

Throughput capability - Increased by 25%

Quality at test - 20% reduction over the past year

Cost per unit - Reduced labout cost by £672 per generator

Build space under crane - 33% less floor space required

The lessons from this event are now being spread throughout the plant without the need for further intervention from Ross International.