Timed production

[Maxie]

We talk a lot about saving time in printing, fast set up and break down, prints per hour.
There have been a lot of video clips on the web lately showing diffetent print shops, Printavo have a few.
What struck me is the amount of time spent preparing the shirts for printing.      Receiving, unpacking, checking and then repacking and getting ready for shipping after printing.
I think we need to start timing this process as well, looks to me that a lot more time is wasted before and after printing.
I understand that if you have limited printing capacity the printing speed is critical but in the costing of the job the rest is, in my opinion equally as important.

[Doug S]

Amen, there are times that I wish I had atleast 1 more employee to help with folding neatly to place back in the boxes.  It take a skilled employee to fold as neatly as they came in so that they fit in the boxes just like they were received.  It's definitely worth consideration in the time study.

[CBCB]

I’m working on tracking our job times but my goal is to see how much time we spend printing versus changing over. I feel like if you get the rest of the processes dialled in then the actual printing becomes way easier.


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[T Shirt Farmer]

IMO having a over all vibe in your shop that "we All work with a sense of urgency every day" and leading by example is far more valuable over time than telling a catcher needs to box 72 shirts in 3 minutes.  Pressing thresholds makes for hurried work.

There is never enough time to it right the first time, but, there is always time to do it over again when it has been done wrong.

[Prince Art]

It is indeed important to understand the whole picture of labor involved in the job, not just print times. One example which comes to mind is the choice of whether to let shirts pile up at the end of the dryer to fold & stack later, or catch & stack as they come off the belt. Letting them pile requires sorting & straightening, which is work that can be omitted with a dedicated catcher. Granted, your overall workload can determine whether the gained efficiency is worth the cost, but that's the kind of the thing that's worth looking at. Even with a tiny shop, it's helped me in pricing to consider all that's really involved in getting the job in the door and back out, not just the time spent on press.

[whitewater]

we have a catcher at end of dryer. As they come out they fold an box up as they are coming off the belt. So when the last shirt comes throught the dryer the order is all set. So we have not spent any time boxing really.

[Prince Art]

IMO having a over all vibe in your shop that "we All work with a sense of urgency every day" and leading by example is far more valuable over time than telling a catcher needs to box 72 shirts in 3 minutes.  Pressing thresholds makes for hurried work.

There is never enough time to it right the first time, but, there is always time to do it over again when it has been done wrong.

Totally agree. You want people to ship defects? Keep them so pressured they're scared to slow down to address QC. A shop attitude of "done quickly, yet done right" is going to ultimately be better than a nonstop, breakneck pace.

[tonypep]

Good timing on this post. Once had an 80K shirt job for a major retailer. Owners took to the bank without doing due diligence. Oops 12 designs on different colors with a pre-pack. Oops individually hangered with size labels that needed to be attached to the hangers. Oops 80 different ship to destinations with their own different requirements. Oops all designs needed to be completed to meet the deadline so we had to farm out to a local printer which oops, required renting a truck and of course pay the printer. Oops I had to rent a warehouse and hire 40 temps to put it all together. So oops, who did not make out on that deal? Pre-op and post op costs should never be overlooked. It got done and on time but there was a lot of sweat effort.The printing is usually easy. Material handling has a cost that many overlook.

[3Deep]

we have a catcher at end of dryer. As they come out they fold an box up as they are coming off the belt. So when the last shirt comes throught the dryer the order is all set. So we have not spent any time boxing really.

This is something we don't do is fold shirts right after they come off the the belt and box, what we have is a fan in a area where we stack shirts and let them cool down before boxing, plus it gives us time for a recount then we label each stack... example 12 m, 25 L, 4 2x etc and then place in the boxes.  Each shop has there own way and I guess if we had 12  plus auto's and thousands of shirts being printed at once and tight deadlines things would be much different, but the one constant we all have to manage large or small is TIME!

[tonypep]

Very well said! Time management does not always apply to the cycle speed of a machine. It certainly is a factor although far too often I see money literally left on the table.

[Sbrem]

It was expressed to us years ago that you'll never run at 100%, the press stops running for all kinds of reasons. So, look over your physical actions, and see where you can cut a few minutes out; involve everyone to maybe get them feeling involved. Suppose you can run at 50%, the rest of the time it's setup and breakdown, startup, emergency maintenance, not enough help when the press operator has to pee, etc. How can you shave minutes off those times to increase the actual output in the same 40 hour week? All of that added production time translates into money that can be shared with the employees as bonuses; they get their regular pay based on goals being met, and if with extra hustle, produce more for the company and therefore themselves. In my very first screen printing job, the company was running 2 shifts, and not doing as well as they would have liked. So, they called in an "efficiency expert" type of firm to observe the normal functions, and then make suggestions. They ended up with a single shift, with the best producers, and increased their profits immensely. I was just a kid really, but learned a lesson from it. So, keep the damn press running!!!

Steve

[ABuffington]

Consistency before speed.  I had a boss once who held a meeting every morning showing us the index speed of each press and our daily yield.  He was not a printer, just a "numbers" guy who felt running at 60% of index speed was a failure.  As production managers we would walk him to the floor and do the math.  That one is at 70%, another running at 60%.  Not good enough.  Of all the things that can go wrong in a shop, putting pressure on a system that is consistently pumping out shirts, winds up crashing the job.  In the morning our goal was to get the press in balance.  Pallets warmed up, inks warmed up, squeegees running at 60% of stroke speed to get the ink warmed and sheared, flashes with a bit more delay due to the cold warehouse all of which dropped us to 50-60% of index speed.  Gradually increase squeegee speeds, lower cycle dwell to zero as pallets hit 160-190 degreees depending on the job. After hitting 0 on the index knob the white base squeegee was the speed control.  Gradually speed it up to increase yield and made sure it cleared the image.  Knock out 4000 full backs in an eight hour shift on an MHM with a 12 color sim process job.  Still not good enough, should have been 6k or higher according to the accountant, numbers don't lie.  This company is no longer in business all due to trying to hit unobtainable numbers.  No loader, or press operator can run at 0 dwell and max squeegee speed on every job all day long and produce quality.

Every job has its own yield speed.  Put a 110 solid white down vs. a 225/40 halftone and the machine will run slower.  There is max speed and then there is reject speed. 
It's a tortoise and hare race.  The tortoise has a press in balance, it will run the same print for days without stopping.  The hare keeps pushing the press, the squeegee speeds, press running too fast to put on tack correctly, no time to stir the ink and shear it, and so on.  Reject rate for the tortoise:  .02%,  the hare? 4-5%.  Haste makes waste is very true with press speed.       

[Maxie]

I agree with Alan when it comes to running the press, I want consistent quality from the press, not maximum speed.
Having said this there is a lot that can be done to improve daily production, for example I have one guy start early.    He gets the days inks ready and sets up so when the rest of the staff arrive the machine is ready to print, oven hot, etc.
But we’re back to the press, the post is really about what else happens in the shop.     We all want our presses to run fast but maybe we need to spend more time checking everything else for efficiency.

[tonypep]

It is often referred to as interruptive downtime. Not often tracked but largely overlooked. The reasons and causes are sometimes necessary but not always so.

[tbarnes]

IMO you should utilize KPI's in each department. You should have an idea of how many impressions a press can do in an hour (factoring setup times, etc.), and try to hold your press operators at or above that number. Same goes for each department. Screens burned or reclaimed, orders processed, garments received/checked in, garments packed/shipped, etc.

If you have a solid process established already, do some time trials and get a general idea of how many should be done per hour, then get your employees to understand that number and have something to strive for. This helps you track employee performance as well as make the process more efficient.