Ireland-based Mannok has successfully addressed a plastic bag weight issue at its cement plant in Ballyconnell, leading to up to EUR350,000 in savings per year.
The cement plant noted an issue with open bags and found that bags were overfilled with cement. Further investigations showed that 80 per cent of bags were overweight, exceeding the one per cent tolerance range of a 25kg bag.
The bagging plant’s check weigher was originally set up to deal with underweight bags, but bags with excess product continued to be put through the system, causing further problems at the sealing station. Productivity was affected by repeated stoppages and health and safety concerns.
To resolve the issue, the bagging team applied innovative Six Sigma methodology, which incorporates data-driven, statistics-based tools designed to improve process management and foster continuous improvement. Failure mode effects analysis, a supplier, inputs, process, outputs, customer (SIPOC) approach, fishbone diagrams, process mapping, and A3 problem solving were applied to the system, which has resulted in the share of out-of-specification bags falling from 83 to 22 per cent.
