Blog
Practical advice for small manufacturers.
Finite vs Infinite Capacity Scheduling: The Same Week, Planned Both Ways
Infinite capacity plans from the due date and assumes the machine is free. Finite plans from what is free. The same five jobs, scheduled both ways.
Utilization vs OEE: What Each One Actually Tells You
Utilization tells you whether a machine is running. OEE tells you whether it is running well. The formulas, a worked example, and which one to track first.
Why Machine Utilization Is Low in a Job Shop
Job shops run lower utilization than production shops, and some of that is structural. Which causes you can recover, which you should stop fighting.
Finite Capacity Scheduling: What It Actually Means for a Small Shop
What finite capacity scheduling means, how to work out your real capacity in machine-hours, and the habits that keep two jobs off one machine. No APS required.
How to Find the Real Bottleneck in Your Shop
The busiest machine is usually not your constraint. Four cheap ways to find the one that really limits what ships, and how to schedule the shop around it.
What Goes on a Job Traveler (And What Most Shops Leave Off)
The traveler is the only document that knows the whole job. Here are the fields most shops leave off it, and what each omission costs on the floor.
How to Calculate Your Shop Rate (And Why Most Shops Get It Wrong)
Your shop rate is only as honest as the hours underneath it. How to build a rate from real numbers, and why the one you inherited is probably too low.
When the Bottleneck Is the Operator, Not the Machine
With machinists this hard to hire, your constraint is often who can run the job, not which machine is free. How to schedule around people, not just spindles.
Reshoring Is Filling Up Your Shop. Is Your Scheduling Ready?
Tariffs and reshoring are pushing work to small US shops. More jobs is good news, until the whiteboard can't keep up. How to take it on without dropping any.
High-Mix, Low-Volume Scheduling for Small Shops (Without an APS System)
High mix and low volume is why your schedule never survives the day. How to run it with the machines and people you already have, no six-figure APS required.