November 1996 € Volume 6 € Number 11

Starting From Scratch

Airbag manufacturer starts over to develop a state-of-the-art manufacturing facility.

By Jim Cotten

Building a new manufacturing plant from the ground up is a rare opportunity. It's much more common for a company to squeeze new production lines into an existing manufacturing setting. Tradeoffs between the ideal manufacturing environment versus feasibility and cost are a reality for managers in this situation.

Yet, the Reeves International Automotive Airbag Group (RIAAG) was in an enviable position -- building for themselves a new world-class facility in Spartanburg, S.C., without the constraints of pre-existing plant floor space or the inherent limitations of non-integrated, legacy computer systems and separated databases.

The new plant houses manufacturing for the high-tech fabric used in airbags. It illustrates a no-compromise design in terms of process integration and fabric manufacturing automation. A combination of Hewlett-Packard application servers and Vectra PCs combined with a suite of applications from Oracle handle the financial and manufacturing data that are integrated across department boundaries and other manufacturing systems to create a truly automated environment.

With no legacy systems to bring over in the conversion, no pre-existing plant design constraints and most importantly, no system integration roadblocks, company manufacturing and MIS managers were able to begin with a clean slate and proceeded from groundbreaking on plant construction to a full working implementation of all systems in less than a year.


Finding new markets in the 1990s
Reeves Brothers, a privately held company, has been in the fabric coating business since the 1940s. Their coated fabrics are used in everyday products such as rubber rafts, industrial tarpaulins and even the inflatable emergency slides used in commercial aircraft. When airbags became a common safety feature in automobiles, Reeves International Industrial Coated Fabrics Group was well-situated to be a major player in that market.

Originally, the fabrics were purchased from other textile producers and Reeves applied the protective coating as they do for many other products. However, in the early '90s, the parent company expanded its role in the business by manufacturing the specialty airbag fabrics themselves and created the Reeves International Automotive Airbag Group, RIAAG.


Working smartly from the ground up
There are advantages to building a plant from the ground up, but there are significant challenges to overcome as well. For starters, this division would not be maintained as part of the corporate umbrella from an information systems standpoint. The task of integrating the plant from hardware to software to machine controls therefore, would be handled entirely by the RIAAG MIS group. Eventually some of the RIAAG systems would be integrated back under the corporate umbrella, but the first priority was to get all of RIAAG's systems up to speed and running efficiently.

One of the first challenges the MIS group faced was selecting the most suitable software to maintain the complex record-keeping required for product traceability. Producing automotive safety equipment demands rigorous attention to quality assurance and requires extensive and complex tracking of the raw materials through the entire production process.

Quality is a top priority in any manufacturing setting, but at the RIAAG plant, quality assurance is the driving force behind every plant-level decision. Each case of yarn received at the plant has been certified by its supplier that it meets specifications.

Statistical sampling is performed after each stage of production, on every batch of roll goods, and used thereafter for statistical quality control purposes. For example, construction and bursting point specifications of the woven and completed fabric must be met and remain within tolerance ranges for every roll of fabric produced. Maintaining test results at each stage in the production process is complex enough, furthermore legal requirements mean that these records will be kept for the expected life of the airbag -- at least 17 years.


Evaluating solution components
Because of the multi-faceted requirements of this manufacturing setting, the MIS department at RIAAG selected the best hardware and software to suit each specific requirement rather than try to find one vendor to satisfy the needs of the entire plant.

As such, Oracle Applications were chosen for a number of reasons. For one, the company's progressive approach to development was seen by RIAAG's MIS group as having earned for Oracle the reputation as the leading edge supplier of data applications. Second, Oracle's suite of applications run on any hardware system and are compatible with other applications that might be needed for point solutions. Third, the group saw that Version 10.5 of Oracle Applications provides an integrated financial and manufacturing system to handle RIAAG's accounting information as well as integrating with another system to track fabric orders through the production process. The smooth integration of these two complex database systems enabled the MIS group to implement both accounting and manufacturing operations in record time.

Customization was another aspect the MIS group considered when choosing software. The type of fabric produced in the RIAAG plant causes an unusual production situation in that overproduction occasionally occurs. The effect of fabric specification allowances and some manufacturing conditions can produce 10,100 yards of cloth from raw materials that would ordinarily make 10,000 yards of cloth. This is no problem from a manufacturing perspective, but it can be quite a problem from an accounting perspective. Purchased software typically allows for underproduction against materials, but not overproduction. As such, the MIS group customized the system's WIP module to reconcile overproduction against a work order.

Running in a client/server environment, the manufacturing management system supports processes companywide, from the financial end with general ledger accounting, purchasing, and inventory to production floor work in progress reporting, order entry, capacity, bill of materials and MRP and MPS at the manufacturing end. RIAAG was able to implement all those systems in just two and a half months. Adopting an integrated system helped speed the implementation process, but the company wanted to customize the software for specific functionality in a number of areas as well. The modules themselves cover most needs, and enabled RIAAG to do further tuning to specific requirements of this operation as well. Typically, implementation of such a complex integrated system requires 12 months or more.

Hewlett-Packard equipment was selected for the majority of the hardware throughout the plant. The HP 9000 G30 server was selected to run the Oracle Applications. Thirty HP Vectras Models VL3 and VL4 are networked as workstations throughout the plant floor and in the front office.


A team view of productivity
In addition to the extensive traceability requirements, RIAAG's commitment to a team approach in managing the new facility placed additional requirements on the MIS solutions within the plant. Operating on a 24-hour schedule, the innovative team approach means that there are no shift supervisors or superintendents present on the off-shifts.

The plant was designed to be a world-class facility at every level. Its impact on the work force, and on the company's bottom line, has been huge. RIAAG managers work to maintain a team perspective to empower each employee. Every production team member, and that includes the administrative staff in the front office as well, knows how to stop the machines at any moment. If an employee perceives that a machine is running in an unsafe condition or that off-quality is being produced, not only are they able to stop the machine, they have the responsibility to stop it. This approach requires that each employee take responsibility for the production process, which in turn generates a sense of empowerment and pride in their work.

For the team concept to succeed, each person on the floor must have access to all production information at all times which requires highly automated and integrated systems. To handle these interface requirements, 30 HP Vectra PC workstations running on a TCP/IP network were installed throughout the plant. Linked to the HP 9000 servers and Oracle Applications databases, production information is available to everyone at any time.


Intelligent integration and installation
Groundbreaking for the $23 million state-of-the-art weaving and coating facility began in Spartanburg in March of 1994. By September of 1994, the first machines started rolling. The 89,000-square-foot plant was built in a modular fashion to facilitate future expansion. It's filled with Dornier weaving machines, Benninger slashers, a number of different makes of finishing machines, and a calendaring machine. Each machine is controlled by its own micro-processor and programmable logic controller. These are networked to a BARCO Sycotex process control and machine monitoring system. It gathers information and passes control information to each of these "intelligent" manufacturing machines on a real-time basis.

But, the integration of the accounting information system with the manufacturing system was a major new feature of the MIS group's work. Materials are entered into the accounting information databases which begins our work processes. The system later records produced goods out. But what happens in between, the system isn't concerned with. The process control system, on the other hand, regulates everything in between.

The system monitors what the machines do, what materials are put on the machines, how many roll goods are produced, and any events that occur along the way. Raw materials are entered into the accounting system to initiate a work order, but the process control system needs that same information. So while the two systems are separate, RIAAG designed and implemented its processes and databases so they could effectively use much of the same information. The fact that no information must be entered more than once enables the company to automate processes all the way through process.

To integrate the two systems, the MIS group created custom code in Oracle and hired a consultant to create a bar coding and material control system using Intermec RF handheld scanners. The MIS group's customization in Oracle produces a flat ASCII file which is transferred to the material control system. The system takes the ASCII file from the financial system and massages it into a format that the process control system can read. When a work order is created, materials are issued to the work order and that same information is automatically transferred to BARCO which needs that information to track materials through the production process.

The process works equally well at the end of the production process. When, for example, a roll of cloth is produced, the process control system generates a bar coded tag for the roll which operators scan with hand-held scanners. The IBSS system translates the scanned information so that the Oracle system records that goods have been produced against a work order from the raw materials issued to that work order.

Not only has the duplicate data entry been eliminated, but the production and accounting cycles have been seamlessly automated as well. In addition, the handheld scanners enable terminal emulation and equips the production team to instantly verify that they're correctly moving raw materials to the proper machines.


One step further
Taking automation one step further, the MIS group recently installed an electronic data interchange (EDI) system to receive order data directly from customers. Purchase order release information is transmitted in ANSI standard format from the customer to the EDI mailbox, which receives and stores the information. That release is then picked up from the mailbox and input to the order entry and planning module.

Shipping notification is also transmitted from RIAAG to the customer within one hour of the truck leaving the dock via this EDI system. Adding this piece of automation provides customers with a simplified means of transmitting their purchase requirements.

Presented with the unique opportunity to create a world-class production facility from the ground up, Reeves International Automotive Airbag Group has demonstrated what a state-of-the-art manufacturing plant can be. Equipped with leading-edge equipment at every step and applying innovative customization for full integration, the RIAAG plant is a model for manufacturing in the 1990s.

Driven by the highest quality assurance standards, the hybrid plant is successfully transforming and evolving a textile process into an important new automotive business. And in the process of becoming ISO 9000/QS9001 certified, RIAAG is supplying high-quality airbag fabrics to tier-one suppliers such as GM Delphi and TRW for use by OEMs, Chrysler, Ford, GM, Saturn, Mercedes Benz, Nissan, Toyota and KIA.

RIAAG Project Background Challenges Reengineer no-compromise fabric manufacturing automation and earn ISO 9000/QS 9001 certification. Enable financial and manufacturing data to be integrated across departmental boundaries and support the company's integrated processes. Data applications must effectively interface with point applications used in manufacturing, inventory management and process control. Enable cost-effective means for extensive quality assurance program and complex tracking of raw materials through production now required by government regulations. Support testing at each stage of production, provide data storage for 17 years. Meet aggressive schedule -- ground-breaking to production in less than one year. Address unusual manufacturing circumstances such as fabric stretch.solution A completely new, world-class manufacturing facility. Enterprisewide integration of processes by deploying a suite of applications that support the company's needs for financial, inventory, engineering, and manufacturing services. HP 9000 E35 and G50 servers 30 HP Vectra PCs, Models VL3, VL4 -- Pentium processors with 16 to 48 MB RAM. Results New manufacturing facility completed in six months, software system up and running in just two and a half months Production machinery is effectively linked to the manufacturing system and issues information on work in progress on a real-time basis. Duplicate data entry and redundant data storage is eliminated, there are no information gaps. Shipping information is released to customers within an hour of a shipment.

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