Enabling RFID technology to track work in progress (WIP) during manufacturing production provides vital data that can be accessed in real-time to give managers greater visibility into the production process. Most manufacturing environments require products to go through a series of distinct assembly stages. The subassemblies or raw materials become WIP and are passed from one station (or location) to another. This is where i-TEK’s cloud and RFID based WIP Tracking Solution provides the advantage as each WIP can be uniquely identified using RFID tags.
As manufacturers strive for a lean, agile manufacturing plant, i-TEK’s WIP solutions give them real-time visibility and tracking they need to keep up with the speed of competition and comply with their customer’s needs. Complex and large-scale manufacturing entail constant monitoring of process and tracking WIP and inventory. This can be carried out successfully using RFID tags which bring a lot of transparency and traceability in the processes. These tags can be deployed to help in management of all assets on the assembly line from manufacturing machinery, equipment and tools to WIP and final goods produced. They help in data collection, maintaining accurate reports and records, finding inconsistencies in process or quality, tracking rework and rejected material and even proper and accurate dispatches. These benefits lead to overall efficiencies and time savings in the production process.
When you're making items composed of many parts, such as airplanes, automobiles, high-tech and consumer electronic devices, machinery, or medical equipment, it's essential—but difficult—to keep track of work in progress (WIP). As many components and subsystems are assembled into individual products, discrete manufacturers need to ensure that the right parts make their way from warehouses to bins to assembly lines when they're needed.
It's also critical that the correct parts are diverted at the right time to the proper locations for painting, subassembly or other work before they can be brought together and incorporated into the final product. Many discrete manufacturers try to track WIP manually, using paper-based logs or entering data into computers or handheld noting devices—all methods that are prone to error, thanks to human fallibility. Even manufacturers that have automated the process using bar-code scanners find that workers often forget to scan some parts or circumvent the system for other reasons. Typically, managers aren't alerted to errors soon enough, so they cause problems down the line. RFID WIP also can improve quality control by tracking each step to make sure it was carried out correctly.
Tracking work in process with radio frequency identification gives you real-time visibility into your processes and operations, which, in turn, saves time, improves quality, data acquisition and reduces costs.
i-TEK’s WIP solution help companies achieve this. By positioning RFID components at different points on the production line, Items passing that point can be identified without human intervention.
One of the case-study in automotive: Tracking in Paint Shop with MES Integration.