National Cranberry Cooperative Case Summary
Background
National Cranberry Cooperative (NCC) had faced operational problems at Receiving Plant #1 (RP1) during the peak harvest season in the fall of 1995, which had resulted in unhappiness of the owners of the Co-operatives and high labour cost, despite the purchase of an additional dumper. To avoid the same problems in the coming peak season, it is important to analyse the plant operations based on predicted demands and make recommendations if new equipment should be purchased before the fall of 1996.
Problem
During the peak seasons, RP1 faces 2 key operational problems: 1. Long idling time of trucks and drivers prior to unloading berries at the plant; and 2. High overtime cost due to the long plant operation hours.
The …show more content…
Following assumptions were made to calculate the capacities: 1. There are 2 continuous flow processes in RP1, 1 for wet berries and 1 for dry berries; 2. Berries flow continuously at a constant rate throughout the entire process; 3. There is negligible flow time at the receiving and testing process, and the process is treated as an inventory; and 4. Trucks spend 7 to 8 minutes to empty their contents and leave the platform and it was assumed that an average of 7.5 minutes was required to unload a truck carrying 75 barrels of cranberries at each of the dumping units.
The process capacities are calculated and shown in Table 1. Process | Type of Berries Processed | Calculation | Capacity (bbls/h) …show more content…
At this rate, the wet bins would be completely filled at 3:25pm. At 7:00pm, when the last truck has arrived at RP1, 4,560 barrels of wet berries would have accumulated, of which 1,360 barrels would be on the trucks. With the plant processing rate of 600 barrels per hour, the trucks would be emptied by 9:16pm with the last truck having waited for 2 hours 16 minutes. The entire process stops at 2:36am, with the total processing time of 19 hours 36
National Cranberry Cooperative (NCC) had faced operational problems at Receiving Plant #1 (RP1) during the peak harvest season in the fall of 1995, which had resulted in unhappiness of the owners of the Co-operatives and high labour cost, despite the purchase of an additional dumper. To avoid the same problems in the coming peak season, it is important to analyse the plant operations based on predicted demands and make recommendations if new equipment should be purchased before the fall of 1996.
Problem
During the peak seasons, RP1 faces 2 key operational problems: 1. Long idling time of trucks and drivers prior to unloading berries at the plant; and 2. High overtime cost due to the long plant operation hours.
The …show more content…
Following assumptions were made to calculate the capacities: 1. There are 2 continuous flow processes in RP1, 1 for wet berries and 1 for dry berries; 2. Berries flow continuously at a constant rate throughout the entire process; 3. There is negligible flow time at the receiving and testing process, and the process is treated as an inventory; and 4. Trucks spend 7 to 8 minutes to empty their contents and leave the platform and it was assumed that an average of 7.5 minutes was required to unload a truck carrying 75 barrels of cranberries at each of the dumping units.
The process capacities are calculated and shown in Table 1. Process | Type of Berries Processed | Calculation | Capacity (bbls/h) …show more content…
At this rate, the wet bins would be completely filled at 3:25pm. At 7:00pm, when the last truck has arrived at RP1, 4,560 barrels of wet berries would have accumulated, of which 1,360 barrels would be on the trucks. With the plant processing rate of 600 barrels per hour, the trucks would be emptied by 9:16pm with the last truck having waited for 2 hours 16 minutes. The entire process stops at 2:36am, with the total processing time of 19 hours 36