Shop Floor Control - Other Pull Mechanisms

5 important questions on Shop Floor Control - Other Pull Mechanisms

How does the PFB strategy work?

WIP level is held constant up to and including the bottleneck, and is allowed to float freely downstream of the bottleneck so the bottleneck will never starve from downstream machine failures.

Does the PFB strategy prevent the bottleneck from starving when an upstream machine or station fails?

No.

Running a card deficit or using a PFB strategy both seem equivalent. Can you think of a reason you would choose PFB over the card deficit? How about a reason for the other way around?

PFB over card deficit: more automatical, no authorization for extra releases is needed.

Card deficit over PFB: works also for a floating bottleneck!

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Does a PFB strategy work when there is a station downstream of the bottleneck that works at a rate barely greater than the bottleneck (assuming equivalent variability)?

Although (theoretically) in the long run it should not matter, temporary WIP explosions are more likely to happen, since the PFB-loop can just continue to pull WIP into the line when the 'second bottleneck' starves due to failures upstream of it.

Are there any good reasons to consider a PFB strategy in a balanced line?

No.

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