Guidelines for Deploying Kanban control strategies in Multiproduct Manufacturing Environments

What is it about?

It investigates the impact of using different Kanban allocation policies in a multiproduct environment. It then uses the observations to develop set of guidelines for determining the suitability of card allocation policies under different manufacturing conditions. Also included is a guide on how to select products for kanban sharing, and when not to share kanbans between products (i.e. when to dedicated kanbans instead).

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Why is it important?

The guidelines listed in the work are good for line designers who have to manage large multiple product manufacturing system. They can be applied in partitioning the line into different segments that can then be managed separately under an identified suitable production control strategy and kanban allocation policy. It can also be applied in creating product families within the manufacturing system - in a similar fashion to Cellular manufacturing system's process-based product families.