True Temper Sports wanted to track downtime and OEE at their golf club manufacturing facility in Mississippi. They were observing an increasing drop in production and wanted to quantify and fix the root causes before they became even more problematic.

After reaching out to Corso Systems via our Inductive Automation Premier Integrator listing, we helped create a solution. We implemented Ignition for PLC communications and reporting—along with OEE and Production Scheduling using the Sepasoft OEE and Scheduling Module.

The Scheduling and OEE Solution

• Inductive Automation’s Ignition platform

• Ignition Reporting Module

• Sepasoft OEE and Scheduling Module

• MySQL Database

Implementation Summary

We worked with True Temper Sports’ Production Supervisor first to fully understand the process and workflow through the facility. Once we understood all of the moving pieces, we were able to build the Production Model. This included each machine, workcenter, and storage location in the facility.

We were able to implement automatic downtime tracking for the automated machines by implementing standardized downtime reason codes in the production model. We also implemented cycle time monitoring for machines with a production counter. Working with their production staff, we implemented a script to read in manually entered production numbers on the manual work stations for accurate information. For a full OEE calculation, we also integrated with their quality control system to input scrap and rework numbers.

After integrating with their ERP system, we built out a table of upcoming work orders. Then, we used the Sepasoft Scheduling tools to build a scheduling interface similar to the work we did on the Champion Pet Foods OEE and Scheduling project.

On top of this, we implemented a fully customizable reporting engine to generate reports with the Ignition Reporting Module. This gave True Temper’s production staff the ability to look at OEE reports by various time slices including days, shifts, and comparisons of shifts across days. We built a Top 5 Downtime Reasons report in accordance to industry best practices, as well as more detailed reports with information on each individual downtime event.

Results

This project gave True Temper visibility into their process at an unprecedented level of detail. Now they can greatly reduce their downtime and production slowdowns by identifying the major causes. Right away, they were able to alleviate a majority of the downtime with more frequent routine maintenance and additional operator training. The extra training also helped reduce overall changeover times when moving between product lines, further increasing their overall productivity.