4 - Group Technology

Group Technology (GT)
Chronology of development of GT
 1925 – R E Flanders (in US) – presented a paper before
ASME – a product oriented departments to manufacture
standardized products with minimal transportation at a
machine company that would today called GT
 1937 – A P Sokolovski (Soviet Union) – Parts can be
classified and parts with similar features can be
manufactured together
 1949 – A Korling (Sweden) – presented a paper in Paris
on ‘group production’ that describe the adaptation of
production line technique to batch production
 1959 – S P Mitrofonov (Soviet Union) published a book
entitled Scientific Principles of Group Technology –
resulted in applying this concept in 800 plants in Soviet
Union
 1960 – J L Burbidge (UK) developed a systematic
planning approach for GT called production flow
analysis
General Features of GT
 GT is based on the principle that similar things should be
done similarly
 GT is a philosophy with central objective of increasing
production efficiency by grouping various parts and
products with similar design and/or production processes
together
 GT has application in many areas related with
manufacturing such as product design, process planning,
fabrication, assembly, and production control
 GT does not seek to reduce variety in the kinds of
products offered to customers
 GT seeks to reduce variety in the kinds of products
produced by the manufacturer
GT in views of different people of a manufacturing
organization
 Manufacturing engineer can view GT as an attempt to
obtain the advantages of flow line system in an
environment previously ruled by job shop procedures
 New part can be designed to be compatible with the
process and tooling of an existing part family
 Standard process plans and tooling
 Standard tooling quickens part changeovers – short
cycle time, just-in-time production
 Design engineer can view GT as an attempt to
standardize products and process plans
 Items with similar geometric features should have
similar designs
 Design of new part is initiated by retrieving the
design for a similar, existing part and modified as
necessary for the new part – sometime eliminate the
need for new part
 For the new part, the new plan can be developed
more quickly by relying on decisions and
documentations previously made for similar parts
 Resulting plan will match current manufacturing
procedures
GT application in manufacturing leads to Focused
factories and Cellular Manufacturing
 Focused Factory strives for a narrow range of products,
customers and processes. The result is a factory that is
smaller, simpler and totally focused on one or two Key
Manufacturing Tasks.
 Focused factory is also called a plant within a plant
 Each focused factory is a portion of a plant devoted to
making a group of several or numerous somewhat-
similar products
 Cellular manufacturing system focuses on a group of
parts (part family)
 Cellular Manufacturing relates to the organization of a
manufacturing facility on the basis of dedicated cells of
dissimilar machines, which process similar parts, called
part families
 This kind of facility layout is called GT layout or
Cellular layout or Group layout
 This configuration is most appropriate for medium
variety, medium-volume environment
 With GT, each part type flows only through its specific
group area
A study shows that by applying GT, 150 similar parts
were placed into a group of 8 dedicated machines
Previously, the same parts had been made on 51
different machines with 87 routing
Types of group layout
 GT flow line: All parts assigned to the group follow the
same machine sequence and requires relatively
proportional time requirement on each machine
 GT cell: Allows parts to move from any machine to any
other machine
 GT Centre: It is a logical arrangement. Machines may be
located as in a process layout by using functional
departments, but each machine is dedicated to producing
only certain part families – Virtual Manufacturing Cell
Part family 1
Part family 2
(a) GT Flow Line

Part family 2 Part family 1
(b) GT Cell
Part family 1 Part family 2
(c) GT Centre
Fig. 1 Types of Group Technology Layouts
Virtual Manufacturing Cell
 In highly volatile manufacturing environments,
functional job shops and classical cellular manufacturing
systems do not perform well.
 Classical cellular manufacturing systems are sensitive to
changing production requirements due to their limited
flexibility.
 In order to adapt cellular manufacturing systems to
volatile manufacturing environments, the virtual cellular
manufacturing concept was proposed in the 1980s by the
National Bureau of Standards in USA.
 Unlike traditional cellular manufacturing systems, virtual
cellular manufacturing systems are most suitable in
production environments that experience frequent
product mix changes.
 This concept is similar to group technology where job
families are processed in manufacturing cells.
 The main difference between a virtual cell and the
classic cell is in the dynamic nature of the virtual
manufacturing cell; whereas the physical location and
identity of classic cell is fixed, the virtual cell is not fixed
and will vary with changing production requirements.
 The virtual manufacturing cell concept allows the
flexible reconfiguration of shop floors in response to
changing requirements.
 The life of a given shop floor configuration continues as
long as the product mix remains relatively unchanged
Demonstrative example – Job shop to GT flow line
DM DM
TM TM
DM DM
TM TM
VMM VMM BM BM
Routing of parts P1, P4, P9

BM Broaching Machine
DM Drilling Machine Routing of parts P2, P3, P7
TM Turning Machine
VMM Vertical Milling Routing of parts P5, P6, P8
Machine
Fig. 2. Arrangement of machines in a jobshop environment
TM DM VMM TM
BM DM BM
DM TM
TM VMM DM
Fig. 3. Arrangements of machines in a Cellular Manufacturing

System – GT Flow line

4 - Group Technology

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Group Technology (GT)

(a) GT Flow Line

Routing of parts P1, P4, P9

Fig. 2. Arrangement of machines in a jobshop environment

Fig. 3. Arrangements of machines in a Cellular Manufacturing

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