ABSTRACT
The Toyota production system is 80 percent waste elimination, 15 percent production system and only 5 percent kanban. Some people imagine that Toyota has put on a smart new set of clothes, the kanban system, so they go out and purchase the same outfit and try it on. At Toyota Motors, early overproduction is not tolerated. The method used to eliminate it is just-in-time production. The term connotes much more than timeliness, however, because concentrating on delivery time alone might encourage early overproduction and so result in unnecessary delay. The progressive change in the relationship between worker and machine is an important feature of the Toyota production system. Many people estimate the average capacity-utilization or operating rate to be about 40 percent. “Sunk cost” is an expression used at Toyota in the context of equipment investment. Fundamental improvement, however, in the form of oil-less bearings and machining, might eliminate the need for lubricating and cutting oils altogether.
