Plastics
The plastics industry is usually characterized by injection-molding machines, extrusion machines, blow-molding machines, presses and/or rotational-molding machines — each one with their own unique method of taking raw plastic (sheets, pellets, powders), adding heat and/or pressure to form a pre-defined shape. These machines, methods and molds can be very complex.
Plastic molds can be very expensive and certain molds can only be used on specific machines, adding a secondary constraint to the manufacturing process. Changeover (switching from one mold to another) can take a long time (e.g. 8 - 10 hours) so that optimizing setup time is typical of the challenges faced by plastic manufacturers.
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- apply rules like "This mold can only be used on these 3 machines" and when one machine is using it, TS knows it is not available for any other machine.
- minimize changeovers and machine setups by scheduling orders with the same configurations to run consecutively, while also ensuring that orders are still scheduled to finish on time.
- automatically balance the work load on the lines within a work center to minimize idle time, reduce setup time and utilize equipment and operators efficiently without losing sight of your order deadlines.
- reduce the time it takes to create a schedule and allows you to respond quickly to changes.
- react quickly to machine down-time.
Plastics manufacturers have turned to Taylor products to help them solve these intricate, mission-critical planning and scheduling problems. Taylor software products have been designed in cooperation with customers like you to solve vexing planning and scheduling problems not addressed by traditional ERP Systems.