You Have Been Asked to Balance a Flow Shop Assembly

question 4

Essay

You have been asked to balance a flow shop assembly operation to achieve an output rate of 80 units per eight-hour day. Task times and precedence relationships are shown in the table below.
$$\begin{array} { | c | c | c | } \hline \text { Task } & \text { Predecessor(s) } & \begin{array} { c } \text { Duration } \\\text { (minutes) }\end{array} \\\hline \text { A } & - - & 1.4 \\\hline \text { B } & - - & 0.8 \\\hline \text { C } & \text { A, B } & 0.4 \\\hline \text { D } & - - & 1.8 \\\hline \text { E } & - - & 0.4 \\\hline \text { F } & \text { C } & 2.1 \\\hline \text { G } & \mathrm { E } , \mathrm { F } & 2.0 \\\hline \text { H } & \mathrm { D } , \mathrm { G } & 1.2 \\\hline\end{array}$$ a. Draw the precedence diagram.
b. Determine the desired cycle time.
c. Determine the theoretical minimum number of stations needed.
d. Balance this line using most following tasks.
e. What is the efficiency of the line obtained in part d?

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Definitions:

Sacrifice Ratio

The number of percentage points of annual output lost in the process of reducing inflation by 1 percentage point.

Inflation

An increase in the overall level of prices in the economy

Output

The amount of goods or services produced by a firm, industry, or economy over a given period.

Sacrifice Ratio

A measure of the economic cost of reducing inflation, calculated as the percentage of annual output lost per one percentage point reduction in inflation.