A Global Manufacturing System Design Project Partnership

Thomas Lacksonen, Tonguç Ünlüyurt,

University of Wisconsin-Stout, USA/ Sabanci University, Turkey

Abstract

The University of Wisconsin-Stout in Menomonie, Wisconsin, USA and Sabanci University in Istanbul, Turkey partnered on the global manufacturing system design project. The project was part of a Facility Design course at Wisconsin-Stout and in a general project course at Sabanci University. The project was developed to meet ABET 2000 Criterion 3 Goal (h), which requires that graduates understand the impact of engineering solutions in a global and societal context.

Project objectives were for students to identify all significant issues in global manufacturing systems design, to collect necessary data for global systems design, and to design a small global manufacturing system. Teams considered equipment design, materials, installation, operation, and cost issues. Courseware residing in the University of Wisconsin system housed collaboration tools. Course documents contained information and web sites containing manufacturing systems design data for each location. E-mail and personal web pages for faculty and students permit direct exchanges, both personal and professional. The courseware is in English, the language of instruction at both schools.

The initial semester’s assessment showed that the projects increased the students’ awareness of global issues, prepared them to perform global projects, and satisfied ABET outcomes. Plans are underway to expand the project to other universities in the U. S. and throughout the world.

Introduction

The Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) 2000 Criterion 3 Goal (h) states “engineering programs must demonstrate that their graduates have the broad education necessary to understand the impact of engineering solutions in a global and societal context” ¹. The developers of these goals recognized the globalization trend, listing it as one of the 11 key goals, along with traditional goals such as analysis and teamwork. Currently most engineering programs meet goal (h) exclusively through liberal arts or social science courses such as Geography, Sociology, or Foreign Language. Yet there are many technical aspects to globalization. Products are designed for global manufacturing, distribution, and sales. Many engineers work on the design, manufacturing, and distribution of global products. At University of Wisconsin-Stout, the industrial advisory board and alumni surveys have verified that a large percentage of B. S. Manufacturing Engineering graduates are involved in some aspect of global manufacturing systems design. On the other hand, Sabanci University is quite a new institution that started admitting students in 1999. The university is continuing its development by considering ABET requirements and aims to be accredited in the near future. The importance of globalization is inherent in the philosophy of the university and described by the following: “The University will cultivate its existing local and regional comparative advantages to generate, articulate, uncover and develop leading-edge knowledge in order to create competitive competencies within an international and global context.” ² This proposal provides technical projects in manufacturing which will enable engineering educators worldwide to meet ABET Criterion 3 Goal (h).

Literature review

Global manufacturing is a major driver of the overall globalization trend, and is expected to increase into the foreseeable future. In the 1990s, world merchandise exports increased by 6.5% per year. Exports of machinery and transportation equipment increased at an even faster rate, at 8% per year. Machinery accounted for $2.75 trillion in exports, or 41.5% of the world’s merchandise trade ³. The breadth of markets is also expanding, as over half the United States companies increased the number of countries in which they operate since 1990.

The growing importance of globalization as a world trend has begun to impact engineering education worldwide. Engineers need to understand how a global enterprise works, from product design to corporate structures ⁴. Isolated courses are not sufficient, instead global themes must run through the curriculum ⁵. To be truly global, the program must consider more than just North American and Western Europe issues ⁶. There have been some joint projects between universities in different countries reported in journals and conferences on engineering education^7,8,9,10. These projects are clearly beneficial, but difficult to replicate. First, the projects all require extensive time and cost to set up the project and collaboration. Second, the projects are difficult to repeat, as extensive effort is required to set up the new design projects. As a result, the projects only serve a small population of students, particularly in the case where study abroad is also required of the students.

The global design project builds on what has been accomplished and addresses many shortcomings of other projects. The project had moderate start-up costs and has minimal costs for each university to repeat the projects each semester. The projects use Internet features to enhance collaboration. The projects will be performed by all students in each program, rather than just a few students. The projects will provide engineering students a cutting edge global experience. The projects can focus on all parts of the world, not just North America and Europe.

Pilot global manufacturing systems design project

The University of Wisconsin-Stout Manufacturing Engineering program in Menomonie, Wisconsin, USA and Sabanci University Manufacturing Systems Engineering program in Istanbul, Turkey have partnered on a global manufacturing system design project. Project objectives are for students to:

- identify all significant issues in global manufacturing systems design

- collect necessary data for global systems design, and

- design a small global manufacturing system.

Specifically, teams of students in Wisconsin designed a small manufacturing cell making a small acrylic part to be installed in a factory in Istanbul, Turkey, and Students from Sabanci University designed a manufacturing cell to be installed in Wisconsin, USA. Projects began in the Fall 2002 semester. The specific assignment for Wisconsin-Stout students is summarized in Figure 1. Sabanci students were given a similar assignment, but were given freedom to modify the project goals based on personal interests. For example, the groups were allowed to choose what type of manufacturing system they would like to install in US. The groups were also allowed to come up with variations of the project. The only requirement was that the proposals should relate to global issues in manufacturing. For instance, one group decided to analyze a real life case, where global companies both from Turkey and US were involved.

Each university was responsible for assisting students from the partner university to collect data and validate their designs. BlackboardÒ ¹¹ courseware residing in the University of Wisconsin system houses two collaboration tools. First, faculty at each university have generated materials and identified web sites providing manufacturing systems design data for their own location. It was anticipated that about 75% of the data collection can be found from these documents. Second, e-mail on Blackboard between universities permits individual students to get answers to specific questions not found in the Course Documents. The Blackboard site and all Course Documents are in English. The folder structure of the Course Documents is shown in Figure 2.

To create a sense of community between students in the two universities, students create their own personal web pages in the courseware. It is hoped that positive personal and cultural exchanges will occur beyond the technical expectations of the project. Faculty at each university communicate with each other about project logistics such as specific course assignments, numbers of students, project due dates. Faculty members may work together to evaluate the technical accuracy of their student projects.

Pilot project results

In Fall 2002, a group of 9 University of Wisconsin-Stout Manufacturing Engineering program students performed a pilot manufacturing cell design project. Sabanci University did not have a project course offered that semester, so the students had to rely on the course documents and personal research to complete the project. Students were generally very pleased with the project, based on a post project survey. There is a statistically significant difference in what students knew about global manufacturing before versus after the project. It is anticipated that the joint project will have even better results. Table 1 shows mean survey results.

Table 1. Student global manufacturing project survey results, Fall 2002

Question	Mean score
I had a good understanding of global issues in manufacturing before doing this project.	2.71
I had a good understanding of global issues in manufacturing after doing this project.	4.14
I am prepared to work with an international vendor or work on an international facility design.	3.86
The Mfg. Engr. Program meets the ABET requirement that I understand the impact of engineering solutions in a global context.	4.14

Scores based on Likert scale with 1 = strongly disagree and 5 = strongly agree.

Manufacturing System Design Project Assignment

Your task is to move the manufacturing lab cell to a facility in Istanbul, Turkey. Your cell will produce acrylic game boards, with the boards being produced in the mill, the pegs produced in the lathe, and the robot loading and unloading machines. Each team will answer questions in one of the areas. Each team will produce one 3-5 page report and a 10-15 minute oral presentation. Additionally, find one interesting fact about Turkey and share it with the class.

Team 1 – equipment issues

1. Will you buy equipment from the same vendor, or a Turkish vendor? If Turkish, identify the vendor.

2. What modifications will you have made to the equipment so it will operate in Turkey? Consider at least power, labeling, and language issues.

3. What are the local safety codes, and what modifications, if any, will be required to make the equipment comply with these codes?

4. What utilities are required to run the equipment, and how will you supply all these utilities?

5. What tooling will you provide, and which vendor will supply the tooling?

Team 2 – materials issues

1. Which supplier will you use for materials – consider U. S. and Turkish suppliers, costs, and quality.

2. If you use a local vendor, how will you identify equivalent material?

3. If you use a U. S. or other foreign vendor, what shipping methods will be used, and by what route? What import fees or tariffs will you pay?

4. What is the cost of the material, including purchase price, shipping, and tariffs?

5. What transportation methods will you use to ship to Turkey, Eastern Europe, and the Middle East?

Team 3 – installation issues

1. Assuming equipment and tooling comes from the same vendors, what transportation methods will be used, by what route?

2. List all documentation required for importing equipment and tooling. Who provides documentation?

3. What import fees or tariffs will you pay on the equipment and tooling?

4. What technical support will be required for installation? For how long? – consider yourself, vendor, and local support.

5. What installation instructions exist? What modifications or translations are required?

Team 4 – operations issues

1. Review all technical documentation – operating instructions, maintenance instructions, and technical documentation. What documentation needs to be created, and how will it be created?

2. What documentation needs to be translated? What translation preparation is required? How will the documents get translated?

3. What operator training must be done and who will perform the training?

4. What are local quality standards? What must be done to insure that the quality standards are met?

5. What spare parts are required at the factory?

6. Which spare parts can be obtained locally and which parts are purchased from the equipment vendor?

Team 5 – cost analysis, based on the recommendations of the other teams

1. What is the initial cost of setting up the cell? Consider the following costs:

Equipment and tooling purchase and modification price Equipment shipping and tariffs

Installation and training Document creation and translation

Initial spare parts procurement

2. What is the unit cost of the product (labor plus materials cost)?

3. What is the overhead cost of the facility compared to a U. S. factory? Consider the following costs:

Building rental and utility costs

Labor costs – management, engineering, technical support

Figure 1 – Proposed assignment for pilot project

0 Course Documents

0 General business information Time zones

0 USA News, weather, business etiquette

0 Turkey “

0 Building and utilities

0 USA Utility suppliers, costs

0 Turkey “

0 Process equipment and tooling Equipment suppliers

0 USA Local suppliers, distributors

0 Turkey “

0 Raw materials Vendors, standard grades, ISO

0 USA Local suppliers

0 Turkey “

0 Transportation and distribution

0 USA Networks, logistics suppliers

0 Turkey “

0 Labor

0 USA Wages, unemployment, unions

0 Turkey “

0 Technical manuals Preparation, unit conversions, translators

0 USA Labeling - ANSI

0 Turkey Labeling - EC

0 Regulations

0 USA OSHA, EPA, tariffs, UL

0 Turkey safety, environmental, EC codes

0 Cultural implications

0 USA Holidays, culture, religion

0 Turkey “

Figure 2 – Current Course Documents setup for pilot project

Joint projects were run in Spring 2003. Wisconsin-Stout students performed a similar small facility design project. Sabanci University students were from an interdisciplinary Introduction to Engineering course. Here, freshman/sophomore students from the Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences and Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (Economics) worked on a variety of projects related to facilities design. The projects were on-going at the time of the publication of this paper.

Preliminary results from the joint project are beginning to appear. Students are able to get most of the information they need from the course documents. They are a bit reluctant to use e-mail and discussion boards. Perhaps the cultural and political differences are intimidating right now. The semesters differ by about 5 weeks between the two universities, making the timing of the data collection and sharing of ideas difficult. The students at Sabanci University are conducting this study as part of a general project course. In this course many project topics are proposed to students, and they choose their topic at their own will. The number of students that choose this particular project was notable.

Benefits and Future Plans

The project enables all students in programs at multiple universities to better achieve the ABET goal of engineering solutions in a global and societal context. Upon graduation, students completing these projects will be better prepared to design manufacturing systems in a global context. They will help make their employers more competitive in the world markets. Compared to other global engineering education projects, this approach is cost-effective. Once the course documents are loaded, only minimal maintenance is needed to keep the site current. Additionally, the project impacts all students in a program because it becomes an integral part of a required course in the program. Finally, the projects are flexible, so different faculty can use the projects in different ways. As already demonstrated, students from different universities, different countries, different classes, different majors, and different course objectives can collaborate and achieve successful projects.

The future goal is to open the course web site up to several partner university programs. The vision is a network of students and faculty from all corners of the world simultaneously solving facility design problems. The course documents could contain information from all over the world, rather than just Wisconsin and Turkey. Students in a class could pick which part of the world in which to design a facility. To participate, the only requirement is for the instructor to populate the course documents with information about their country or region and for the students to participate in answering questions from other students. Anyone interested in participating in these projects should contact Tom Lacksonen, lacksonent@uwstout.edu.

Bibliography

[1] ABET (2001) Criteria for accrediting Engineering programs, effective for evaluations during the 2002-03 accreditation cycle, Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology, Inc: Baltimore, MD.

[2] Sabanci University (2003) www.sabanciuniv.edu/english/index1.html.

[3] World Trade Organization (2001) International Trade Statistics, WTO: Geneva, Switzerland.

[4] DeGraaff, E. and Ravesteijn, W. (2001) Training complete engineers: global enterprise and engineering education, European Journal of Engineering Education, (26) 4, 419-427.

[5] Irandoust, S. and Sjoberg, J. (2001) International dimensions: a challenge for European engineering education, European Journal of Engineering Education, (26) 1, 69-75.

[6] Johnston, S. F. (2001) Towards culturally inclusive global engineering, European Journal of Engineering Education, (26) 1, 77-89.

[7] Cannon, D. M. and Leifer, L. J. (2001) Product-based learning in an overseas study program: the ME110K course, International Journal of Engineering Education, (17) 4-5, 410-415.

[8] Henderson, M., dePennington, A., Baxter, J., Wells, V. (2000) The global engineering design team, American Society of Engineering Education Annual Conference, St. Louis, MO.

[9] Green, L. N. and Bernabei (2000) International collaboration in an industrial design studio, Global Journal of Engineering Education, (4) 1, 43-48.

[10] Andersen, A. (2001) Implementation of engineering product design using international student teamwork – to comply with future needs, European Journal of Engineering Education, (26) 2, 179-186.

[11] Blackboard Inc. (2003) www.blackboard.com.

Biography

Tom Lacksonen is Associate Professor of Industrial Management and Program Director of the M. S. Management Technology program at the University of Wisconsin-Stout. His teaching and research interests include facility design and global manufacturing issues. He has a B. S. from Toledo, M.S. from South Florida, and Ph.D. from Penn State, all in Industrial Engineering. He is a registered P.E. and a member of ASEE and IIE.

Tonguc Unluyurt is Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences at Sabanci University. His teaching and research interests are in combinatorial optimization, simulation and supply chain management. He has a B. S. in Industrial Engineering from Bilkent and a Ph.D. in Operations Research from Rutgers. He is a member of INFORMS.

“Proceedings of the 2003 ASEE/WFEO International Colloquium

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