Intern Contributes to Continuous Improvement
Summer Intern Contributes to Continuous Improvement at Saegertown
At the conclusion of his summer internship, theengineering intern at MFCS Saegertown presented an overview of the vast list of projects in which he was involved.
One project of interest was backing up and organizing over 600 PLC programs used at Saegertown. His goal was to create functionality through order, and make a central location where users can easily find what they are looking for. He did what he set out to do, and trained the users on the system.
The engineering intern also presented results from his cardboard-engineered parts counter prototype used to tally production of couplings. The main issue to overcome with this project was that parts needed to be in a “metered” flow in order to be counted; the output of the washer currently is a batch style process. He worked with the team to evaluate the issue to be solved, brainstorm solutions, select a solution and determine testing criteria. The final counter was designed by one of our SaegertownProcess Engineers for our engineering intern to program, debug, and test. Testing results of the counter yielded a 100% accuracy rate.
The engineering intern participated in a weeklong SMED Kaizen event at the nose turn chucker. The Kaizen was very successful cutting down the change over time from 68 minutes to just 19 minutes. This was achieved through 5S and the design of jigs and gauges. He did the design work for the jig setups, and developed the three gages used to measure the nose OD.
Another project our intern worked on was a new automotive cell. He helped to install sensors, and limit switches to improve part flow in the system.
When asked to reflect on his time at MFCS Saegertown, he said he felt the mentoring was very useful, and he enjoyed “lean thinking” and “cardboard engineering.” He felt his ideas were valued and that he did “real” work and brought value instead of working on theoretical projects.
Unfortunately for MFCS Saegertown, the summer came to a close, and we had to wish our engineering intern the best of luck as he headed to Boston University to complete his Master’s Degree in Biomedical Engineering.
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