Definition

Reconciles the time capacity and the required time on a production line. Line balancing consists of calculating the takt time for a line and adjusting the line activities on the line to the takt time. You assign line activities to the line segments in such as way as to enable the activities to be completed within the pre-determined takt time.

Use

You balance lines if you produce several materials or material variants on a production line at one time (model mix production). For such a model mix production, the line activities in the line segments can have a different duration for the individual materials. Takt-based scheduling does not take into account the execution times, but multiplies the takt times with the number of takts. Therefore, you must assign the line activities to the line segments or work areas in such a way that the available time is utilized optimally with the average work content , represented by the capacity requirements of the line element.

Within a line balance, you can assign production resources to the line elements. This assignment represents the available capacity at the line elements, as the amount of time available at the line element is calculated from the assigned production resources. You can adjust the available capacity at a line element to suit the work content. For example, you can increase the number of production resources at the affected line segment. See also: Assignment of Production Resources

The assignment of line activities to the line elements also indirectly determines the installation points of the components that are assigned to the line activities. The system then determines the staging locations (supply areas) in the following processes and the exact requirements dates of the components. When you wish to assign supply areas to line segments, you must balance the line segments. When you wish to assign supply areas to work areas, you must balance the work areas. See also: Assignment of Supply Areas

As the model mix or the assignment of line activities to the line elements usually changes in time, you can create several line balances with defined validity periods .

Structure

There is a separate object that represents line balances in Integrated Product and Process Engineering. It is part of the factory layout application. See also: Creating a Line Balance

The iPPE object line balance consists of header data, which contains the description of the line balance and the line structure to which it is linked. There are also tab pages for maintaining and displaying data.

Integration

The line balance rate that you define on the Line Balance tab page is only used for one line balance. For planning in the APO, you must define production rates for the line resource in the APO.