Process reengineering and improvement for building precast production

Current production methods for the building of precast concrete elements are gradually becoming insufficient to meet industry demands. Most precast factories incorporate fixed molding production lines to produce building structural elements such as beams, trabeculae and pillars. Improvement of current production has reached its limits. The objective of this study is to perform process reengineering so as to create more efficient precast processes. The results of the literature review and advice from 16 experts suggest that the current process used to produce a precast element, which is comprised of 16 steps in a single module, should be redesigned to include 13 steps in 3 modules. Using historical data as input, the Arena software, Version 13, is adopted to simulate both the traditional and proposed methods, and then compare the results for practicability. An overall savings of production time of 24% can be reached by changing the current/traditional method to the flow-shop type production method. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.