INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING USE OF A SPREADSHEET

F. E. Fields
Industrial Enaineering Superintendent

ICI Americas Inc.

Indiana Army Ammunition Plant
Charlestown, Indiana 47111

ABSTRACT

Through the e f f i c i e n t use of a microcomputer, the time required to i n i t i a l l y analyze

data and to develop labor and material standards has been greatly reduced. To an even
greater extent, the time required to perform periodic updates of the data and of the
labor and material standards has also been reduced. This paper describes how a spread-
sheet is used to accomplish these tasks, as well as some discussion of other data col-
lection and analysis for Industrial Engineering projects.

KEYWORDS

Industrial Engineering; Work Measurement; Motion and Time Study; Labor Standards; Mate-
r i a l Standards; Interactive Spreadsheets; Maintenance Data Analysis.

INTRODUCTION

In Industrial Engineering our work frequently calls for us to analyze masses of data.
This is especially true in Work Measurement. Work Measurement involves the collection
and analysis of hundreds and thousands of small time values generated through time
study, predetermined time systems, work sampling studies or a combination of these or
other techniques. This has always required long, tedious hours of Industrial Engine-
ering time. This paper w i l l describe how this work is performed with a microcomputer
and an electronic spreadsheet. Once the raw data is entered, along with the necessary
formulas, the microcomputer extends and manipulates the data to develop the labor stand-
ards, as well as to printout forms for the daily production t a l l i e s and efficiency cal-
culations. The four examples of the use of the spreadsheet in this paper w i l l be pre-
sented from an overall managementviewpoint. This paper w i l l not attempt to explain
how to use the various commandsor j u s t which key to use for what purpose. For the ac-
tual hands-on application of Lotus I-2-3 or other spreadsheets, classes, or one-on-one
training can usually be found.

BACKGROUND

ICI Americas is a wholly-owned subsidiary of ICI Limited of England. ICI has about
123,000 employeeswith production f a c i l i t i e s in over forty countries and sales offices
in over sixty countries. ICI produces agriculture products, synthetic fibers, general
chemicals, industrial explosives, Organic and specialty chemicals, paint and decorative
products, petrochemicals and plastics, pharmaceuticals and related items. ICI Americas
has production and sales in the U.S. for most of these items, for example, Stuart Phar-
maceuticals is a subsidiary. Specifically, ICI Americas is the prime contractor for
two Army Ammunition Plants (AAP's) - Volunteer AAP in Chattanooga, Tennessee and Indiana
AAP across the Ohio River from Louisville, Kentucky. At Indiana AAP we have 1,800 em-
ployees. Our job is to (1) maintain the manufacturing and support buildings and equip-
ment as the Army specifies, (2) to modernize old f a c i l i t i e s or equip new f a c i l i t i e s as
funded by the Army, and (3) to produce the howitzer and mortar ammunition to the Army's
specifications and time table.This includes propelling charges for the I05MM, 155MM and
8" Howitzers and the 4.2" Mortar. Actually, what we do is to take r o l l s of cloth, s l i t
the cloth to the right width, cut i t to shape, sew i t into bags, and print i t in our Bag
Manufacturing f a c i l i t y . These empty bags are then transferred to load lines where they
are f i l l e d with propellant powder, sewed, and packed.

The Industrial Engineering Department has three sections with a supervisor for each sec-
tion. One section handles the Value Engineering, Self-Amortizing and Employee Sugges-
tion programs. A second section covers Production Work Measurementwhich develops l i s t s

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 FIELDS: I n d u s t r i a l E n g i n e e r i n g Use o f a S p r e a d s h e e t 313

of equipment needed, production layouts, detailed methods descriptions, and preliminary standards
prior to each production run. During the production run they help solve production problems, de-
velop final standards and implementcost reductions. At the end of the production run, they devel-
op an as-built manual which includes production layouts, l i s t s of equipment, and f i f t y or sixty
photographs of all production operations in use at that time. They also develop Direct Material
Standards. The third section of the Industrial EngineeringDepartment covers work measurement for
indirect operations. This section developsmethods and standards for Material Handling, which is
quite extensive on plant; Receiving Inspection, Quality Assurance Labs including Metrology Lab,
Weights Lab, ChemLab, and Physical Lab, as well as to develop benchmarks for MaintenanceWork
Measurement. Both of these work measurementgroups use MTM-I, 2, 3, 4M and GPD to set standards.
One of the Industrial Engineeringsupervisors is a certified MTM instructor and is also on the
Training and Qualifications Committee of the MTMAssociation for Standards and Research. Overall,
our Production and Indirect Work MeasurementPrograms show a savings of $800,000 to $1,O00,O00 each
year.

DIRECT MATERIALSTANDARDS

The Direct Material Standards are developedon the personal computer with a printer located in the
IE office. I t produces the Material Standards Matrix which shows all of the direct materials used
to make the product, and amount of material neededfor each. The materials are listed for each
product, showing the material code, description of the material, nameof the part, and the unit of
measure for that material. I t also shows the "I00%" which means the amountof that material that
goes into the part and stays in i t . For the f i r s t operation, " S l i t Cloth," the "I00%" of material
is shown. Next i t gives the "I00% with offal" which includes the skeleton or other necessary mate-
rial loss due to the shape of the part. For example, cutting circles out of a piece of cloth will
leave a skeleton of cloth that has no further use. The scrap percent is shown next on the matrix.
Through on-the-floor studies we have determinedthe amountof material loss that is unavoidablefor
the particular operation. Next i t gives the "subtotal" which is the total of I00% material, offal,
and scrap for that material for that operation. Each succeeding operation is calculated as shown
on the matrix in order, with a cumulative subtotal given after each operation. This matrix is the
heart of the material standards program, performing most of the required calculations while avoid-
ing an explodedview of the entire production process for a specific product. As you could see,
data enters the matrix via "I00%" and "usage with offal" input for all material involved. This data
may be input by the user or from other matrices. Since data may be input from other matrices, a
large, unwieldy matrix may result. However, a large matrix may be broken down into smaller, more
easily managedsubmatrices without losing control of the material flow through the production pro-
cess. The matrix is designed to have a uniform configuration for all products produced. This uni-
formity permits interchangeability of matrices betweenproduct lines. The matrix performs most of
the calculations for the system, and provides general overview of material usage and flow through
the production process. Finally, the matrix summary is generatedby the computer. I t has two pri-
mary purposes. First, i t summarizes the immenseamountof data provided by the matrix and second,
provides a final copy of the Direct Material Standards that can be issued. This eliminates the
need for a secretary to type the final copy, saving labor and reducing the chance for error. The
main advantageof the use of this system is that Industrial Engineeringmanhours have been reduced.
In addition, once the system is installed, maintenanceof the standards is greatly simplified. The
matrix is quite helpful as i t provides a visual display of material needs, offal and scrap as the
product proceeds through the manufacturing process. This system appears flexible and shows promise
in other areas besides material standards, such as labor standards~ estimating, etc.

ENGINEERED MATERIALAND LABORSTANDARDS

This is the newest part of our program. This program provides Integrated Labor and Material Stand-
ards which can be dollarized by Accounting to give incremental product costs at any stage of produc-
tion. The basic purpose is to provide a dollar value for scrap generatedand collected at various
points in the manufacturing process. The Integrated Labor and Material Matrix shows the samedirect
material buildup as the Material Matrix does. I t also shows the manhours required per piece for
Production labor and for Inspection labor. I t then gives a subtotal for labor for that operation
and a cumulative subtotal of manhours.

USE OF A SPREADSHEET IN RECEIVING INSPECTION

The operation of the Indiana Army Ammunition Plant requires a considerable number of indirect or
support operations. The nature of explosives require considerable distance betweenproduction and
storage f a c i l i t i e s , separation of the storage of explosives and inert material, etc. This requires
considerable material handling. Also, an extensive Quality Assurance organization and various labs
are neededto provide very precise weights, and to conduct numerous and involved testing of raw
materials, work in process, and completed products. In addition, propellant powdermust be repack-
aged from large containers (for long distance hauling) to smaller containers (necessary in produc-
tion), and dried (to lower the percent of moisture in the powder) as necessary. With this informa-
tion and the fact that the plant is two miles wide and five miles long, then maybeyou can get an
idea of the need for the indirect operations and hundreds of employees in these areas of indirect
operation. The examplethat follows concerns the Receiving Inspection operation which is a function
of the Quality Assurance Department. This operation requires several inspectors who very closely
inspect and pull samples to test all incomingmaterials. Since the Army has very detailed specifi-
314 PROCEEDINGS OF THE 8TH ANNUAL CONFEEENCE ON COMPUTERS AND INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING

cations for materials, they expect us to f u l l y inspect and test the materials to insure that these
materials are within acceptable l i m i t s .

LABOR STANDARDS

The Industrial Engineering manpowerrequired to develop the i n i t i a l labor standards decreased

s l i g h t l y when the computer with spreadsheet was installed and in use. However, the Industrial
Engineering manpowerrequired to revise the standards decreased drastically. Manually, this had
taken 4-6 manweeks to revise the Receiving Inspection standards, now with a personal computer and
spreadsheet, i t only takes two manhours. Since the quantity per l o t varies substantially, there is
a definite need to review and revise the standards frequently. This changes the inspection sampling
requirements and, thus, requires a change in the standards. Plantwide, we normally review standards
once a year. However, in this case, we review these standards every quarter.

PROCEDURE

The procedures to develop this type of Indirect Labor Standards is somewhatdifferent from the de-
velopment of Production Labor Standards. Thirteen weeks of data giving the number of lots and the
number of pallets, r o l l s of cloth, dunnage assemblies, etc., inspected each week is input for each
item of material handled. This is put into a spreadsheet. The totals and averages/week for each
product are calculated by the computer. A three sigma standard deviation is then figured by the
computer. Any data that f a l l s outside of these l i m i t s is discarded and the new totals and averages
are recalculated by the computer. The new weekly averages are applied to the quality assurance
tables to determine the sample size for inspecting materials in a batch process (MIL STD I05). The
resulting sample size per l o t for each material is then used with the basic MTM standards to provide
a standard time value per l o t . Obviously, the MIL STD I05 tables and the basic MTM standard data
are already in the computer. The last step is to printout t a l l y sheets for the operators to record
the number of items and lots they inspect by day of the week. On the back of the t a l l y sheet the
operators write the number of manhours on standard and the number of manhours o f f standard (and for
what reasons).

USE OF A SPREADSHEET IN MAINTENANCE

The Plant Engineering Department at Indiana Army Ammunition Plant is quite large as could be expected
with this size of a f a c i l i t y . Indiana Army Ammunition Plant covers over lO,O00 acres, has 15DO
buildings, 18O miles of roadway and 90 miles of railroad tracks. To maintain this f a c i l i t y we have
over 300 maintenance mechanics. Supervising these mechanics are 31 foremen. These foremen have a
d i f f i c u l t time, to say the least, of actually being able to supervise these mechanics. A foreman
may have four to six different crews working most anywhere on the IO,O00 acres. Although Maintenance
has a good system of planning, scheduling, engineered standards, as well as planners and inspection
engineers, you can imagine that the foreman has a d i f f i c u l t time trying to effectively supervise his
numerous crews. The Plant Engineering Manager approached Industrial Engineering for assistance on
how to help the foreman spend more time on actual supervision of his mechanics. Industrial Engine-
ering needed to, f i r s t , find out how the foremen were actually spending their time. Then they would
t r y to reduce the nonsupervisory a c t i v i t i e s so that the foreman would have more time to actually
supervise their crews. Since Industrial Engineering had been having quite good results using work
sampling studies throughout the plant, work sampling was considered as the f i r s t approach. However,
on anaysis, i t did not seem too practical, considering the d i f f i c u l t y of actually trying to locate
the 31 foremen constantly moving around the large f a c i l i t y . A second approach was then considered
and adopted. I t called for each of the foremen to record their own a c t i v i t i e s . A foreman's daily
log was i n i t i a t e d for this purpose. On the log the foreman listed his a c t i v i t i e s under three cate-
gories: paperwork, contacts with mechanics, and other. Due to the unusual nature of the maintenance
work at Indiana Army Ammunition Plant, a t r i a l run was made to find out what various a c t i v i t i e s the
foremen actually do. Discussions were conducted with foremen to obtain their f u l l , positive cooper-
ation. The proper attitude of the foremen was quite c r i t i c a l to the success of this type of study.

THE SPREADSHEET

Next we developed a system to summarize the data. Since Maintenance had just received an IBM Per-
sonal Computerwith a Lotus I-2-3 spreadsheet, we decided to use these. We then developed a spread-
sheet format that gave percent of time for each line item, standard deviation with upper/lower limits
and minimum/maximumtimes.

STUDY AND ANALYSIS

Each of the 31 foremen f i l l e d out a daily log each day with the study covering one f u l l month. This
gave us over 600 daily logs which contained over 40,000 items to be entered into the computer. This
data entry was started by our Industrial Engineers working with the daily logs of the f i r s t two or
three foremen and debugging as they went. When the program seemed to be working well, the data en-
t r y was turned over to clerical personnel. The computer produced a summaryof each of the 31 fore-
men's daily logs plus a summaryby general foreman. With this multitude of summary sheets, we
paused to analyze what we had and to decide what else we needed. Then i t was easy to summarize the
 FIELDS: Industrial Engineering Use of a Spreadsheet 315

data in other ways, i . e . , the foremen covering different crafts or different areas of the plant.

RESULTS

Through the personal computer's a b i l i t y to handle this mass of data, and show i t in various spread-
sheets summarized in many different ways, we were able to clearly analyze how each foreman was
spending his time. This lead to questioning as to why and how they were doing the various parts
of their jobs. I t lead to the transfer of some paperwork to clerks. Also, i t lead to a realization
that we d i d n ' t have enough vehicles assigned to Maintenance, since sometimes the foremen didn't have
transportation to v i s i t their crews. This resulted in the reassignment of nine vehicles to improve
the effectiveness of some of the maintenance crews. Also, one foreman moved his office to a d i f f e r -
ent building to be closer to the work area of his maintenance mechanics. These and other actions
have resulted in a reduction in Maintenance backlog since the study. At this time, a year after
the study, our Plant Engineering Department Manager, General Foremen, Foremen and Industrial Engine-
ers are s t i l l analyzing and raising questions. We gained numerous "tangible" results plus a much
improved, cooperative s p i r i t within our Maintenance Supervision. In the future we plan to use the
personal computer and the Lotus I-2-3 spreadsheet to help us undertake additional studies in Main-
tenance and elsewhere at Indiana Army Ammunition Plant.

CONCLUSION

Throughout these examples of using a personal computer with spreadsheet, we have seen how i t has
saved Industrial Engineers a tremendous amount of time and enabled us to complete assignments sooner
We have looked at the development of Direct Material Standards, Integrated Labor and Material Stand-
ards, Receiving Inspection Standards and a special study for the Maintenance Department. For the
work that we were previously doing with pencil and calculator, i t has reduced our time requirements
substantially. The Industrial Engineers' time that we saved has enabled us to do audits of methods
and standards that were long overdue, to go farther and faster in the development of work methods
and standards in new areas, and to do special studies for Managementthat has helped ICl Americas
do a better job in operating the Indiana Army Ammunition Plant. For the new assignments that we
receive, such as the Integrated Labor and Material Standards, Maintenance Foremen Study, etc., the
personal computer with spreadsheet has enabled us to do more indepth studies, more analysis from
different perspectives and to provide the results and our recommendationsmuch sooner. I f you get
the chance, I ' d strongly recommendthat you t r y out the spreadsheet on a PC. The results could be
as beneficial for you as i t is for us.