Bombardier is setting world standards for manufacturing methods.
Graham Warwick/MONTREAL
BOMBARDIER, ALMOST single-handedly, has restored Canada to a position in the major league of aerospace nations - initially through acquisitions, then with product launches, and now in sales growth. Next, it aims to lead the aerospace industry in manufacturing efficiency.
Once Canada's industry rode high on projects such as the Avro CF-105 Arrow interceptor and Canadair CL-84 tilt-wing. Its resurgence is founded on more down-to-earth projects - corporate and regional aircraft - and has a solid export base, reflecting the reality of the country's low spending on defence.
When Bombardier acquired Canadair in 1986, the Montreal based company was building 16 Challenger business jets a year. Now it is producing two Challengers and five Regional Jets a month, delivering the CL-415T amphibian, developing the Global Express long-range business jet and preparing to launch the CRJ-X stretched Regional Jet.
When Bombardier took control of Toronto-based de Havilland in 1992, Dash 8 production had slumped to two a month. Now it is producing four aircraft a month and has launched the high-speed Dash 8-400. It is building wings for sister company Learjet's Model 45 business jet, engine nacelles for Canadair's CL-415T, and will assemble the Global Express.
While other manufacturers have been shedding employees to become more efficient in the face of declining production, Bombardier has been improving efficiency to increase production without adding massively to its workforce. At Canadair, revenues have more than tripled since 1990, but the number of production employees has grown by only 600 and manufacturing floor space, has been reduced by 35%.
This has been largely because of the Bombardier manufacturing system (BMS), conceived and developed in the Canadian company's mass-transit business, where it has been in use since 1975 and introduced to Canadair in 1990. The system is now being implemented at de Havilland and Learjet, in Wichita, Kansas.
Roland Gagnon, executive vice-president for manufacturing at Bombardier Aerospace Group - North America, is hesitant at first to describe the system, which he regards as a major competitive advantage over other manufacturers, but he quickly warms to a subject, which is obviously a personal passion.
"The Bombardier manufacturing system is not just a way of doing things, but also a way of thinking," he says. "It is a philosophy first, a way of organising work, a way of transferring and using information, and a way of motivating employees."
It is not an overnight transformation. A company-wide training effort is under way, as is a "tremendous" effort to categorise some 200,000 parts, over five different programmes, and load them into a computer database. All subcontract work has been converted, the Challenger and Global Express are being done, and the Regional Jet is next.
BENEFIT REALISED
Training and conversion will not be completed until 1997, but already Bombardier has realised 60-70% of the benefit projected in 1990 when adaptation of the BMS to aerospace began at Canadair, Gagnon says. The results are evident. In 1991, it took 165 working days from the start of Regional Jet wing assembly to delivery of the aircraft. By October, when output reaches five a month, it will take 50 days. This compares with an industry standard of 180-200 days, he says.
Gagnon explains the philosophy: "Engineering takes the aircraft and breaks it down into parts; manufacturing takes the parts and assembles the aircraft. Engineering only knows the sequence [in which the aircraft is assembled] when it has all the drawings, but manufacturing can start with the parts and then get the sequence. They can start early, meet in the middle, and cut cycle time by half."
A key feature is a move away from traditional, serial, communications. "A drawing revision would go from engineering to methods to planning to production control to purchasing. That takes days. Now it goes to everybody [simultaneously], indicating what action to take, and they all react at the same time," he says.
Using the illustration of a design change, Gagnon says: "If engineering revises a drawing, the information is sent to quality, methods, manufacturing, and purchasing the same day. The inspector knows to stop any affected parts. He can go out on the line and hold the part wherever it is. It then becomes an issue of what to do with the non-conforming parts. We can stop a part, take action and then confirm. The new part gets on the aircraft much more quickly."
In the traditional system, Gagnon explains, an inspector might only become aware of a change when he receives a revised drawing with an effective date, which means that several affected parts could already have been produced and installed. In the new system "...all you need is notification of a change" to stop a part.
Under the BMS, all design changes must be made, by engineering. If manufacturing finds a problem, then an engineering-change request (ECR) is sent to engineering. Revisions are only issued when a drawing is available. "If you make a change, you need a drawing. You can always rework a part, but you never stop the line," he emphasises. This prevents engineering holding up production while it works on a design change. As a result, Canadair has had to speed up engineering redesign. "Every morning there is a meeting between engineering and methods to handle all requests for engineering changes. We do not let the ECRs pile up," Gagnon says.
Another key aspect of the BMS is reducing the learning curve - the number of repetitions of an operation it requires before the man-hours needed to complete the job bottom out. This is important because, as new employees are added to increase the production rate, they take time to learn the job - increasing the man-hours required and the cost of the aircraft. Gagnon is blunt saying, "If you need more employees, you are dead" - unless the learning curve can be reduced.
Aircraft manufacturing is a complex task, traditionally handled by specialised workers. Gagnon says, that there are typically 200 to 300 job codes - specialisations - among aerospace-company employees. Each entails a learning curve for the new employee. Manufacturers have a choice he says, use specialised workers, or simplify the work. Bombardier has opted for the second option, at least on the assembly line.
"If we can simplify operations so that everybody can do them, then we can eliminate job codes. There is only one job code on the assembly line [at Canadair] - subassembly to final assembly - we can put anybody anywhere on the line. They all get paid the same, so there are no more arguments," he maintains.
Training costs are increased, but learning-curve costs are reduced and flexibility and job security is enhanced. Assembly-line employees work in cells. "They can all do each others' jobs. They don't care who does what," Gagnon says. The flexibility gained allows Canadair to recover delays by transferring people to the problem area. "We can create a bank of subassemblies, then transfer those people to the final-assembly line. That way we don't have to hire people or pay overtime," he explains.
Bombardier's aim in simplifying operations is to eliminate drawings from the shop floor. Drawings produced by engineering, are simplified by methods technicians, using sketches and photographs instead of drawings, to illustrate the work path. Methods works with manufacturing to produce the first article, make any modifications, photograph the tasks and then release the work instructions.
Standard times are developed for all actions and operations, and workers are expected to achieve them within 20 to 25 aircraft "...versus 200, according to learning-curve theory", Gagnon says. No allowance for a learning curve has been made for the production transition, now under way, from the Challenger 601-3R to the improved 604, he reveals, although there are substantial differences in detail between the two aircraft.
The incentive for employees to adapt to Bombardier's philosophy is simple, Gagnon says. "The incentive is keeping the job. To assure the job, the employee has to make a future for the company - not the company guarantee a future to the employee. The image of specialisation guaranteeing a job is wrong. If a company cannot compete, the employee will lose the job," he explains.
EFFECTS EVIDENT
A tour of Canadair's Montreal plant shows the effects of implementation of the Bombardier manufacturing system. Challengers, Regional Jets and CL-415s are taking shape in a packed assembly hall, where wings and other sections are put together on platforms raised above the fuselage assembly lines. Gagnon plans to make room here for the production of Global Express nose sections and CRJ-X stretched Regional Jets.
The inventory system has been eliminated. Instead, the parts store stocks only enough components for a few days' production. New supplier agreements guarantee long-term contracts in return for parts delivery at the same rate aircraft are being produced, Gagnon explains. Parts no longer arrive in batches to sit on shelves for months. The loading bay is in continuous use.
Kits consisting only of those parts needed for a day's work are assembled and delivered to workstations on the assembly line. Gagnon wants to automate this process, with a robot train linking the workstations, and to remove all parts bins from the assembly line, creating space.
In another innovation, most of the functional and reliability testing has been moved, from the flight line to the production line, where it is performed by the assembly workers themselves. The result of this has been fewer snags and a reduction in test flights, from seven to eight down to one or two, Gagnon says.
The Bombardier manufacturing system seems to be working. The next step, now starting, is the introduction of a common engineering system across the Bombardier Aerospace Group North America companies: Canadair, de Havilland and Learjet. A two-year effort is planned to capture and document the best practices at the three companies to create a system, which will harmonise and standardise engineering across the group.
Source: Flight International