Collaborative post – may contain affiliate links

Manufacturing is so exciting. You can literally watch the idea in your head come to life slowly but surely. However, it’s also a very technical area of business. It requires a lot of engineering know-how to get it done right. Form in design is nothing if the practical sense of the product and the process is neglected. The process by which you manufacture your products will be at the heart of your operations and core processes. One of the things that catch young business owners off is, overloading the process and trying to get multiple stages of the manufacturing process done in too few steps.

Part or tool replacement

If you find that your workers or your robotics are having to replace tools too often, it’s because you might be overloading them. Speak with the tool’s manufacturer to see how many uses it should give before it needs to be repaired or replaced. For example, a stamping machine for sheet metal, will need its cutters replaced after a certain amount of cuts made or years depending on the manufacturer’s recommendation. 

If your tools need replacing before the manufacturer’s recommendation, this is because you are overloading them. You need to either buy more equipment or tools or do fewer jobs with it. Using a tool wear detection software, gives your managers a heads up when a part is overloaded and or needs to be replaced.

Loading your trucks or racks

If you have your own freight service to companies i.e. you deliver our manufactured product to another business as they can use it, such as computer chips, you should know just how many products you can deliver at once. The use of industrial scales would greatly help you to stop overloading your vehicles and racks that store inventory. Take a look at the logistics, manufacturing, and transportation scales which take into account a heavy load being moved. Static storage and moving freight have different characteristics, so getting the correct scale matters. 

Overloading vehicles

If you have a large plant, then transporting parts in egress to another part of the plant is probably common. Your vehicles may be small vans, pick-up trucks, freight trucks, open-bay vehicles like ATVs. Do not be tempted to overload your vehicles even if they seem to be fine. It can not only damage the suspension and surface they are driving on, but the vehicle becomes harder to control. It might not be able to steer as tightly, and the acceleration is hampered thus taking more time to go from one point to another. 

• Always make sure you know how much weight each of your transportation vehicles can take. 
• Train your driver to drive the vehicle under heavy load conditions so they understand how the vehicle behaves. 
• Make sure the path they are driving on is clear of debris and remains clear at all times.

Overloading in manufacturing is very common, unfortunately. Deadlines have to be met and schedules have to be stuck to, but this should never risk your products, employees or assets.