Lean six-sigma implementation in an automobile axle manufacturing industry: A case study

Continuous improvement in the manufacturing industries is the prime requirement to make the organization profitable. Lean manufacturing and six sigma are old techniques to improve the production of the industry by eliminating waste. These tools help the industry to grow worldwide in the competitive environment. This paper is based on the case study of a well-known automobile transmission components manufacturing industry. This industry manufactures about 33 types of axles for different vehicles and was facing the problem of rejection in one of its rear axle components. The industry was losing Rs. 7,33,000/- every month due to rejection of this rear axle. Lean six sigma (LSS) was the tool implemented to find and eliminate wastages. The current state map was made for this product by using historical three months data from the industry. The layout of the shopfloor was changed to reduce the transportation of the product and to manage the space for best utilization. 5S was implemented to make everything easily assessable. Drastic improvements have been achieved after the successful implementation of LSS like the rejection rate was reduced from 10.4% to 3.20 %. The shop floor area for processing the axles has been reduced from 252 m2 to 90 m2 after change in layout. The distance travelled by the material was reduced from 4050 m to 809 m. The sigma level was also improved from 3.34 to 3.94. The lead time was reduced from 12 days to 11 days.