Minomi—A Material Flow Revolution in Small Steps

The most complex activity in an automobile assembly plant is not making the cars—it’s getting all the parts and components into the right place as the production lines move inexorably on. When a car body is made, the parts are first stamped from rolls of steel, the overall body is welded together to create a shell, and then the individual parts are welded together into the body on a moving assembly line. Many of the parts of the steel body are large enough that moving them to the assembly line has been a problem since Henry Ford. Getting the logistics of parts management and delivery right is even more difficult in the Toyota Production System (TPS) because of the downsizing or removal of inventory buffers that cover up any problems in han....kaizen