Production Automation – Reconciling Pace and Flexibility

Many reasons support the need for companies to automate their process control. And the key factor influencing the automation requirements is to increase productivity and shorten the time to market. Manufacturing plants covering a large physical area heavily rely on the process of automation for the safe monitoring and accurate control of the production processes. However, industries like food manufacturing, brewing or small traditional manual operations have also replaced their manual operations by automated control systems. In this competitive era, the only way to achieve the competitive advantage is by improving the production by implementing higher levels of automation.

Advantages commonly attributed to automation include

1. Higher production rates
2. Increased productivity
3. More efficient use of materials
4. Better product quality
5. Improved safety
6. Shorter workweeks for labours.
7. Reduced factory lead times.

The biggest reason that fully justifies the use of automation is the higher output and increased productivity. Automated systems typically perform manufacturing process with less variability than human workers, resulting in greater control and consistency of product quality. Also, increased process control makes more efficient use of materials, resulting in less scrap.

Another advantage of automating the industry process is the decrease in the number of hours worked on average per week by the factory workers. According to a survey, in a company of about 1900 the average workweek was approximately 70 hours. With the implementation of automation tools and machines, the standard workweek was calculated to have gradually reduced to about 40 hours. The two key factors - mechanization and automation played a significant role in this reduction.

Automating the industrial operations has also increased the safety of the worker as automation often removes workers from the workplace, thus safeguarding them against the hazards of the factory environment. However it is gradually becoming a national objective of making work safer and protecting the physical well-being of the workers in all sectors of the industries and plants.