Knowledge management and knowledge discovery for process improvement and sustainable manufacturing: a foundry case study

Defect reduction is an essential step for the implementation of process improvement and sustainable manufacturing strategies. In the foundry industry minimisation of defects poses immense challenges due to the complexity of production processes with hundreds of factors influencing the quality of the final casting as well as part specific quality constraints. Process improvement methodologies like Six Sigma and Lean Manufacturing have traditionally been applied to address these challenges but, in order to develop smart and sustainable growth strategies, there is the need to retain and re-use the intellectual property that is created during these activities. This paper discusses the role that knowledge management plays in assisting process engineers to discover improvement opportunities. It also proposes a new methodology, called 7Epsilon, that links product specific process knowledge and current data analysis practices to achieve zero defect manufacturing. As part of the 7Epsilon methodology (http://www.7epsilon.org) a novel data driven approach to discover noise free correlations among process factors and responses is illustrated through a practical case study.

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