Progress 07/01/07 to 06/30/12
Outputs
OUTPUTS: 8th Lean Manufacturing Workshop for Wood Products. Instructor: Earl Kline and Brian Brashaw. Location: Princeton, WV. Dates: May 7-9, 2007. Total Productive Maintenance for the Forest Products Industry. Instructor: Earl Kline, Brian Brashaw, and Robert Vatalaro. Location: University of Minnesota Duluth, Duluth, MN. Dates: March 27, 2008. Remaining Competitive in Hardwood Components Production. Instructor: Buehlmann, Urs, Brian Bond, Earl Kline, Jan Wiedenbeck, Ed Thomas, Thomas Walthousen, Steve Lawser, and Steve Ehle. Location: Princeton, WV. Dates: April 20-21, 2009. Total Productive Maintenance for the Wood Products Industry, Joint video Broadcast workshop in South Boston, VA and Duluth, MN: Attendance: 11 in VA, 9 in MN. Instructor: Kline, D. Earl, Brian Bond, Brian Brashaw, and Robert Vatalaro. Location: South Boston, Virginia. Dates: November 17, 2010. Kline, D. Earl and Urs Buehlmann. 2010. Lean Manufacturing for small and medium sized wood products companies. Lean Manufacturing for Small & Medium Sized Wood Products Companies. Sustainable Forest Future. Invited Presentation. Utica, NY. November. Kline, D. Earl. Benchmarking value stream improvement in the wood products industry. Quarterly industry audits begun in Spring 2012. Incorporated value stream improvement techniques in undergraduate course, "Wood Enterprise Institute, (WOOD 3445-6)." PARTICIPANTS: Faculty advisors and project directors (6): Earl Kline, Brian Bond, Steve Prisley, Urs Buehlmann, Henry Quesada, and Brian Brashaw. Graduate Students (3 Ph.D., 3 Masters): Tim Stiess, Garrett Norman, Brandon Martin, Omar Espinoza, Jim Bisha, and Chao Wang. Partner Organizations (3): USDA Forest Service, Northeastern Research Station and Wood Education and Resource Center, and the Natural Resources Research Institute, University of Minnesota-Duluth. Professional Development: 35 workshops and short courses delivered to over 400 professionals and managers in the forest to consumer value chain. 2 Masters of Science degrees, 1 Masters of Forestry degree, and 3 Ph.D. degrees completed. TARGET AUDIENCES: Target Audience: Undergraduate students, graduate students, research scientists, faculty, forest industry resource and business managers, natural resources policy makers and stakeholders. Efforts: University undergraduate curriculum development, undergraduate and graduate student advising, in-service training and experiential learning, workshops, industry conferences, scientific conferences, value chain benchmarking, and consulting. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period.
Impacts
This research has developed systems and standards to better connect the forest resource with consumers of wood products. An effective method of disseminating this information has been used to direct developed concepts toward 1) improved equipment/technology maintenance systems and materials management systems 2) measurements that drive more effective and improved value chains, and 3) leadership development focus. A series of teaching modules and training exercises has been developed to teach this knowledge to the public through regular workshop offerings, to graduate students through development and application of research methods, and to undergraduate students through experiential learning activities. Finally, these teaching modules have been incorporated into the undergraduate and graduate curriculum at Virginia Tech as a basic learning element required for a degree.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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Progress 10/01/10 to 09/30/11
Outputs
OUTPUTS: Supply Chain Management Workshop: Trends and Opportunities. Instructors: Quesada, H.J., Sobotka, D, Haviarova, E., Kline, D.E., Espinoza, O., and Dugan, D. Location: Vincennes University. Jasper, IN. Dates: May 17, 2011. Lean Manufacturing for small and medium sized wood products companies. Instructors: Urs Buehlmann, Earl Kline, Steve Rohde, and Collin Miller. Locations: Augusta, ME, October 19, 2010; Montpelier, VT, October 20, 2010; Concord, NH, October 21, 2010; Utica, NY, November 4, 2010; Glens Falls, NY, November 3, 2010. Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) Workshop (Joint video webinar). Instructors: Earl Kline, Brian Bond, and Brian Bradshaw. Locations: South Boston, VA and Duluth, MN, November 17, 2010. Total Productive Maintenance Workshop for Hardwood Products Manufacturers. Instructors: Kline, D. Earl and Dan Cumbo. Location: American Hardwood Industries, Waynesboro, VA. October 11, 2010. PARTICIPANTS: Faculty Advisors and project directors: Earl Kline, Brian Bond, Urs Buehlmann, Henry Quesada, Brian Brashaw. Graduate Students: Jim Bisha and Chao Wang. Partner Organizations: USDA Forest Service, Wood Education and Resources Center; Natural Resources Research Institute, University of Minnesota-Duluth. Professional Development: 8 workshops delivered to 193 forest industry and natural resources managers. TARGET AUDIENCES: Target Audience: Undergraduate students, graduate students, research scientists and faculty, forest industry business managers, natural resource managers and stakeholders. Efforts: University undergraduate curriculum development, undergraduate and graduate student advising and mentoring, workshops, industry conferences, academic conferences, business consultation. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period.
Impacts
Basic research conducted in the first 3 years of this project has developed the foundation body of knowledge to help connect the forest resource to consumers of wood products through technologies and best practices to help improve value chains. Through this research, it was found that 1) improved maintenance systems, 2) more effective supply chain management efforts, and 3) leadership development focus are three critical areas where stakeholders in forest to consumer value streams can improve operations and reduce waste. To offer technology transfer and training for these stakeholders, a series of workshops and seminars has been developed and offered to address the first two critical areas. Training programs are currently under development to address the third critical area of leadership development and are scheduled to be offered in the next reporting period.
Publications
- Omar Espinoza, Brian H. Bond, Earl Kline. 2011. Supply Chain Measures of Performance for Wood Products Manufacturing. Forest Products Journal 60(7/8):,700-708.
- Brashaw, Brian, D. Earl Kline, Brian Bond, and Robert Vatalaro. 2011. Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) for the Wood Products Industry. Final Report, Cooperative Research Grant # 07-DG-11420004-104. Wood Education and Resource Center, USDA Forest Service, Princeton, WV. 161 p.
- Chao Wang, Henry Quesada, Earl Kline, Urs Buehlmann. 2011. Using Value Stream Mapping to Analyze an Upholstery Furniture Engineering Process. Forest Products Journal (in-press).
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Progress 10/01/09 to 09/30/10
Outputs
OUTPUTS: Short course on "Energy Saving using Lean Thinking" (Instructors: Henry Quesada, Earl Kline, G. Tyler, M. Webber, and S. Walls, Sept 10, 2010, South Boston, VA). Short course on "Maintenance Excellence" (Instructors: Earl Kline and Urs Buehlmann, August 26, 2010, Atlanta, GA). Short course on Strategic Frameworks (Instructors: Henry Quesada, Earl Kline, and Bob Bush, May 20, 2010, Richmond, VA). Workshop on "Learning to See" (Instructors: Urs Buehlmann and Earl Kline, August 5, 2010 in Harrisonburg, VA, May 5 2010 in Richmond, VA, May 6 2010 in Danville, VA, April 15, 2010 in Abingdon, VA). Workshop on "Advanced Lean Thinking - Pull Systems" (Instructor: Earl Kline, April 14, 2010, Princeton, WV). Workshop on "Advanced Lean Thinking - Continuous Flow Systems" (Instructor: Earl Kline, March 26, 2010, Princeton, WV. Workshop on "Lean Manufacturing Train the Trainer" (Instructor: Earl Kline, November 13, 2009, Blacksburg, VA). Timothy Stiess. May 2010, Ph.D. "Information Sharing in the Hardwood Supply Chain". Workshop on "Total Productive Maintenance: Getting Started" (Instructor Brian Bond, October 15, 2009, Hopwood, PA). PARTICIPANTS: Faculty advisors and project directors: Earl Kline, Brian Bond, Urs Buehlmann, Henry Quesada, Brian Brashaw, Omar Espinoza. Graduate Students: Tim Stiess, Dan Cumbo, Wang Chao, Christian Fricke, Mathias Schmitt. Partner organizations: USDA Forest Service, Northeastern Station and Wood Education and Resource Center - Southern Virginia Higher Education Center, South Boston, VA - Danville Community College, Danville, VA - Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology, Ireland - Natural Resources Research Institute, Duluth, MN - Mississippi State University, Starkville, MS. Professional Development: 9 short courses/workshops delivered to 64 industry/govenment professionals and community college faculty. 1 PhD. dissertation completed. TARGET AUDIENCES: Target Audience: undergraduate students, graduate students, research scientists, faculty, Industry professionals, Government professionals, community college faculty. Efforts: University curriculum development, Community college curriculum development, off-campus workshops/short courses, industry trade conferences, individual company consultation. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period.
Impacts
The Hardwood Industry in United States has been challenged by low-cost competition from overseas. Although cost reduction strategies have had minimal success, the proximity of industry to the domestic market has large implications on a more customer-focused strategy. How fast material and information flow through the hardwood supply chains is the key to the industries' ability to be customer-focused. Building on previous project outcomes which focused on material flow in the hardwood supply chain, progress made in the past year focused on information flow. Project outcomes showed that increased information flow between supply chain members increased material flow through the supply chain. For a case study supply chain, an increase in information flow, through advanced knowledge of customer demand by a supplier, was found to reduce the inventory buffers throughout the supply chain by up to 38 percent and increase the total material flow through the supply chain by 10 percent. In addition to the increased information flow caused by the advanced knowledge of demand (18 percent), information flow would increase (by an additional 7 percent) based on the reductions in buffer inventory within each company of the supply chain.
Publications
- Omar Espinoza, Brian Bond, and Earl Kilne. 2010. Quality Measurement in the Wood Products Suppy Chain. Forest Products Journal 60(3):,249-257.
- Buehlmann, Urs, D. Earl Kline, and Janice K. Wiedenbeck. 2009. A regression-based method for estimating rip-first rough-mill lumber yield. Forest Products Journal 59(11/12):48-55.
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Progress 10/01/08 to 09/30/09
Outputs
OUTPUTS: Activities - observational experiments from 7 case study businesses, survey conducted on 107 respondents, teaching of university graduate and undergraduate students of experiemental results. Events - results disseminated at 3 workshops/conferences 1) Business and Research Opportunities for Virginia Hardwood Products Workshop, Sponsored by the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, Department of Wood Science and Forest Products, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, June 3, 2009 2) Presentation at the 2009 Annual Industry Studies Association Conference, Chicago IL, May 27-29, 2009. 3) Panel Presentation at the National Research Center for Coal and Energy (NRCCE, West Virginia University Morgantown, WV, April 22 - 23, 2009. Services - Environmental Audits for 1 company to improve hardwood industry business performance. Products - prototype GIS software system to better understand the hardwood supply chain. PARTICIPANTS: Training or professional development - undergraduate students through classroom training, graduate students through mentored research projects. TARGET AUDIENCES: Target audiences - Hardwood forest landownders, hardwood primary manufacturing businesses, hardwood secondary manufacturing businesses, furniture/cabinet retailers and distributors. Efforts - development of teaching curriculum, classroom teaching, experiential business simulations, webinars and tradtional workshops. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Not relevant to this project.
Impacts
Change in knowledge - fundamental knowledge and benchmark data on business information flows and its impact on the hardwood supply. This knowledge is critical to developing best management practices and supporting policies that will lead to changes in actions resulting in improved conditions later on in this research project. Change in actions - N/A. Change in conditions - Environmental audit resulted in hardwood material and related energy savings of $490,000 per year.
Publications
- Kline, D. Earl. 2008. Forest Industry Sustainability Begins with the Customer. HMR Executive 2(11):1-2,4.
- Rappold, Patrick, Kline, D. Earl, Bond, Brian H., and Wiedenbeck, Janice K. 2009. Reciprocal estimation of the raw material cost of producing hardwood lumber using the principles of activity based costing. Forest Products Journal 59(7/8):84-90.
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Progress 10/01/07 to 09/30/08
Outputs
OUTPUTS: Spring Workshop on Total Productive Maintenance for the Forest Products Industry. Instructors: Brian Bond, Earl Kline and Amy Jahnke. Location: Richmond, VA. Dates: May 15, 2008. Winter Workshop on Total Productive Maintenance for the Forest Products Industry. Instructors: Earl Kline, Brian Brashaw, and Robert Vatalaro. Location: University of Minnesota Duluth, Duluth, MN. Dates: March 27, 2008. Workshop on Inventory management basics for small scale wood processing. Instructors: D. Earl Kline and Brian Bond. Location: Radford, Virginia. Dates: October 19, 2007. Invited Presentation. Kline, D. Earl. 2008. Demand driven materials management: from the "woods" to the consumer. TMS Annual Meeting & Expo, New Orleans, Louisiana, March 9-13. Invited Poster Presentation. The Woods to Goods Community: Building Supply Chain Partnerships and Meeting End-User's Needs. Stiess, Timothy and D. Earl Kline. 2008. Panel World Expo, Atlanta, Georgia, February 7-9. PARTICIPANTS: Faculty advisors and project directors: Earl Kline, Brian Bond, Steve Prisley, Rien Visser. Graduate students: Tim Stiess, Garrett Norman, Brandon Martin, Omar Espinoza. Partner organizations: USDA Forest Service, Northeastern Research Station and Wood Education and Resource Center. Professional development: 2 workshops delivered to 25 forest industry managers and 1 masters thesis completed. TARGET AUDIENCES: Target Audience: Undergraduate students, Graduate Students, Research Scientists and Faculty, Forest Industry Business managers. Efforts: University curriculum development, off campus workshops, industry conferences, academic conferences, individual company consultation. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period.
Impacts
A forest to consumer case study was conducted to benchmark the process lead time and document all activities that occur to convert hardwood timber into a finished kitchen cabinet ready to be installed in a home. The lead time for hardwoods to travel from the forest through the sawmill, dry kilns, rough mill, machining, manufacturing and assembly before a completed kitchen cabinet is delivered to the contractor was found to take 200 business days (nearly one year). Most of this total lead time is spent in various forms of idle inventory and time trying to store, track, find, and manage it. Time translates to money, and excessive hardwood inventory sitting idle represents money that is not flowing and not working for the benefit of the industry segments in the supply chain. There are significant business opportunities here to truly understand what final customers want in their products and then to better service them by finding creative and more efficient ways to make hardwood materials flow more quickly and effectively. This case study is being used to develop course/workshop materials for students and professionals to help better manage a more sustainable forest to consumer value stream.
Publications
- Martin, Brandon, Earl Kline, Steve Prisley, Rien Visser. 2007. Online information systems for today's Forest industry. Austro2007/FORMEC-2007: Meeting the Needs of Tomorrow's Forests - New Developments in Forest Engineering, October 7-11, 2007, Vienna and Heiligenkreuz, Austria.
- Buehlmann, Urs, D. Earl Kline, Janice K. Wiedenbeck, and Robert Noble, Jr. 2008. Validation of the Standardized and Simplified Cutting Bill. Wood and Fiber Science 40(2):202-213.
- Buehlmann, U., J. K. Wiedenbeck, R Noble, and D. E. Kline. 2008. Creating a Standardized and Simplified Cutting Bill Using Group Technology. Wood and Fiber Science 40(1):29-41.
- Norman, Garrett T. 2008. Pull Manufacturing System Design for Rough Mill Systems - A Case Study. M.S. Thesis, Department of Wood Science and Forest Products.
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Progress 10/01/06 to 09/30/07
Outputs
OUTPUTS: Lean Manufacturing for Wood Furniture Production: "Train the Trainer." Instructor: John Hudson, Ken Martin, and Earl Kline. Location: Stanleytown, VA. Dates: June 19-21, 2007. Earl Kline. 2007. Lean Systems to Improve Competitiveness. Technical Session at the Forest Products Society, 61st International Convention, June 11, 2007, Knoxville, TN. Garrett Norman and Earl Kline. 2007. Rough Mill Management for the Lean Customer. Technical Session at the Forest Products Society, 61st International Convention, June 11, 2007, Knoxville, TN. Earl Kline and Brian Brashaw. 2007. Application of Manufacturing Simulation Games for Change Management Training in the Wood Products Industry. Technical Session at the Forest Products Society, 61st International Convention, June 13, 2007, Knoxville, TN.
PARTICIPANTS: Faculty advisors and project directors: Earl Kline, Brian Bond, Steve Prisley, Rien Visser. Graduate students: Tim Stiess, Garrett Norman, Brandon Martin, Omar Espinoza. Partner organizations: USDA Forest Service, Northeastern Research Station and Wood Education and Resource Center.
TARGET AUDIENCES: Target Audience: Undergraduate Students, Graduate Students, Forest Industry Business personnel. Efforts: University Classes, Off-Campus workshops, Individual company consultation, conferences.
Impacts
The traditional forest to consumer value stream proceeds as separate, independent functions. Independent functions translate into timber and logs that are treated more as a plentiful raw material, lumber is treated as a commodity, furniture, cabinets and other consumer goods are pushed from the manufacturer to the customer. Our objective is to bring these separate functions together and make them work as if they are all owned and operated by the same business with coordinated and deliberate functions that precisely meet demand. The objective is to make the "woods to goods" value chain consumer oriented. This will translate into being competitive and sustainable. We are at the beginning stages of benchmarking the forest industry supply chain in terms of its responsiveness and effectiveness at meeting end-consumer demand. Preliminary results indicate that it costs both in terms of time and money, to manage around long lead times, artificial demand created by the supply
chain "bullwhip effect," and mismatches of placing the right wood materials toward the right end-products. This cost drags on the ultimate competitiveness and sustainability of the entire forest to consumer supply chain. Global outsourcing further extends this drag and complicates both resource and business sustainability even more. Our current outputs have primarily been presentations to local communities and businesses to help our forest industry supply chain identify and prioritize improvement opportunities that can benefit all industry segments and ultimately better service the consumer and society.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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