JUST IN TIME CONSTRUCTION METHOD

RMB 511 CASE STUDY: INNOVATION IN THE MALAYSIAN HOUSING INDUSTRY

TABLE OF CONTENT

Description Page No.

Report Objectives & Task framework 3

Chapter 1: Introduction and Understanding of JIT

1.0 History of JIT Concept 4

1.1 Definitions 5

1.2 The Concept And Philosophy 7

1.3 The JIT principles 7

Chapter 2 : JIT in Manufacturing

2.0 Implementation in Automobile Manufacturing 11

2.1 Ford KA in JIT 13

Chapter 3 : JIT in Construction Industry

3.0 Application in Construction Industry : An Overview 17

3.1 Factors That Influence Housing Developers to use JIT concept

in Construction Industry 18

3.2 Issues And Challenges in Construction Industry 25

3.3 Problem Areas 30

3.4 Strategy in Construction JIT 33

3.5 Conclusion 35


Chapter 4 : JIT and IBS

4.0 JIT and IBS 37

4.1 Classification of IBS 38

4.2 Value Stream Mapping 42

4.3 Example Structural Steel Supply Chain in Building Construction 44

Chapter 5 : Case Studies

5.0 Case study 1 49

Case Study 2 53

Case Study 3 56

Chapter 6 : Case Study Malaysian Scenario (PUTRAJAYA) 60

Chapter 7 : Conclusion 68

References 70


Report Objectives :

1. To get a better Understanding of Just-In-Time (JIT) Philosophy and Concept

2. To identify the factors that influence the housing developer firms to innovate,

that is by adopting new ideas, new concept, new process or introducing new

idea, or new procedure of doing things in to their organization.

3. To identify the factors that stop, discourage, or deterred the firms from

innovation JIT concept in the Construction Industry

Task Framework :

Understanding of JIT concept

Implementation in Manufacturing Industry

Issues and Challenges in implementing JIT concept in Construction Industry

Recommendation and Solutions towards the implementation

Implementation in Construction Industry


CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION OF JUST-IN-TIME

1.0 History of the JIT concept

JIT is a technique developed by Taichi Ohno and his fellow workers at Toyota.

Ohno's fundamental purpose was to change production's directives from estimates

of demand to actual demand--a purpose originally rooted in the absence of a mass

market and the need to produce small lots of many product varieties. It was based

on lean manufacturing, that an outgrowth of the Toyota Production system was

developed by Taichii Ohno in the 1950s. Ohno had observed mass production at

Ford Motor Corporation’s manufacturing facilities in the U.S. and recognized that

there was much waste everywhere.

Ohno identified seven wastes in mass production systems – overproducing,

waiting time, transporting, processing itself, having unnecessary stock on hand,

using unnecessary motion and producing defective goods. Very importantly, Ohno

visualized a failure to meet customers’ needs as waste. The Toyota Production

System was based on the “Just –In – Time (JIT) philosophy; its three tenets were

minimizing waste in all forms, continuous improvement of processes and systems,

and maintaining respect for all workers. It resulted in reduced inventories (and

space) higher human productivity; better equipment productivity and utilization,

shorter lead times, fewer errors, and higher morale. JIT is a pull system that

responds to actual customer demand. In essence, products are “pulled from ” the

JIT system. JIT only commits the resources needed to meet the customer’s needs.

In the mid – 1970’s Toyota reduced the time needed to produce a car from fifteen

days to one day, using JIT.


Supply Chain Management (SCM) emerged as part of the Just in Time

delivery system; its primary focus was logistical to control the interface between

suppliers and Toyota, facilitating the provision of supplies precisely on time, in

required quantities. A supply chain encompasses all the activities that lead to

having an end user provided with a product or service – the chain is comparable to

a network that provides a conduit for flows in both directions, such as materials,

information, funds, paper, and people. It typically effects major economies by

reducing inventories. SCM has been developed further as a management concept

and incorporates features of JIT.

1.1 Definitions : Reviews of JIT Philosophy

JIT has gained considerable interest because it allows a company to produce

high quality products with reduced waste and with increased levels of productivity.

Several authors have discussed the JIT philosophy, including Sugimori et al,

Mullins, Monde, Hoeffer, Nelleman and Smith, Schonberger, McElroyHall, Harper,

and Richard.

Schonberger describes the JIT system as to: "produce and deliver finished

goods just in time to be sold, sub-assemblies just in time to be assembled into

finished goods, and purchased materials just in time to be transformed into

fabricated parts". Schonberger also categorises the benefits of JIT into the following

five groups:

(1) Part cost — low scrap cost, low inventory cost.

(2) Quality — fast detection and corrections, and higher quality of parts purchased.

(3) Design — fast response to engineering change.

(4) Administrative efficiency — fewer suppliers, minimal expediting and release

papers, and simple communication and receiving.

(5) Productivity — reduced rework, reduced inspection and reduced parts delay.


Monden describes JIT as "a production system to produce the kind of units

needed, at the time needed and in the quantities needed". Whilst Harper describes

it as "the hottest and most controversial subject facing manufacturers and

distributors". The interest in JIT amongst manufacturers, suppliers and distributors

is understandable especially if their products have to face home and international

competition from manufacturers who have implemented the JIT principles

effectively.

Monden also discusses the various factors which constitute smoothed

production at Toyota under the various types of Kanbans and their usages and

rules. He describes the techniques Toyota applied to achieve a short supply lot

production time, waiting time and conveyance time. He also identifies four concepts

that comprise the Japanese approach to reducing set-ups.

Hall states that JIT "is not confined to a set of techniques for improving

production defined in the narrowest way as material conversion. It is a way to

visualize the physical operations of the company from raw material to customer

delivery". There is no aspect of management which JIT does not touch.

It eliminates waste in all areas of manufacturing — including marketing,

planning, sales and production — whilst maintaining and possibly improving

customer services because it identifies and changes manufacturing conditions which

cause waste to exist.

According to Hoeffer, the JIT system is a combination of purchasing,

inventory control and production management functions. Materials are purchased in

small quantities with frequent deliveries just in time when they are needed. Under

the JIT system, the parts needed for one day's operations in a manufacturing or

assembly line are supplied by in-plant sources of suppliers for immediate use.


The benefits of using the JIT philosophy became of particular interest

forconcerns because of rising manufacturing costs arising from increasing labour

and material costs in the late 1970s, its efficiency being achieved through:

(1) suppliers' co-operation and support;

(2) commitment of every person within the organisation, and

(3) small size purchasing, smoothing production, designing flexible processes,

standardising jobs and employing Kanban.

1.2 Concept and Philosophy

The JIT concept was developed by Taiichi Ohno (Hartley, J. R. 1981) of

Toyota to improve Toyota’s competitiveness in the global market and soon it was

adopted by many Japanese industries. By early 1980s, many Western managers

found themselves losing ground in the manufacturing “race” against the Japanese.

Imai (Imai,M. 1991) liked many other Japanese, attributed the Japanese industrial

success to the concept of JIT. According to Pooler (Pooler, V. H. and D. J. Pooler.

1997), a common misconception of many managers in the eighties (and even

today) is that JIT, in a narrow sense, was another planning tool that simply requires

all the supplies to be shipped exactly as needed on time. In fact JIT has a much

broader perspective than that understanding. It is a broad-based philosophy of

management, which embraces everybody in the organization and covers every

process towards a culture of never ending or continuous improvement by removing

wastes and non-value-adding processes.

1.3 The JIT Principle

The JIT philosophy, also commonly known as the Toyota production system,

originates from Japan. Toyota was the first company to implement this system

which streamlined production with minimum holding inventory. Land costs in Japan

are high due to its scarcity. Inventory takes up space and down capital. In the JIT

philosophy, raw materials are not stocked up. Instead, they are delivered in the


right quantities, in the right condition, to the right place, and at the right time for

production. JIT has proven to work well in the manufacturing sector (Lim and Low,

1992; and Chan 1997).

The fundamentals of JIT are very much intertwined and related to another. To

simplify this management philosophy, its concept can be explained using the

following six key principles:

1. Kanban or pull system

One of the principle of JIT concepts is the kanban or “pull” system. This

principle can be effected only if the other principle of JIT are executed in

totality. The essence of this principle is simply that the flow of materials is

“pulled” by the demand side. Without authorized kanbans (or “pull”

demands) from a workstation is not allowed to sent any materials forward.

2. Top Management commitment and employee involvement

Top management is the driving force and executive power for JIT

implementation. Management’s efforts and time commitments are necessary

to ensure that disciplined and correct operations are carried out accordance

with the JIT concept. A motivation and workforce will provide the desirable

for production. Management and employee must constantly seek continuous

improvements to existing work. Process so that the production system can be

further streamline and its lead time shortened. JIT is about improvement and

should be regarded as a means to an end and not an end itself. Continuous

improvement is only possible if employee involvement stays commuted to

the philosophy.

3. Elimination of waste

Under the JIT concept, waste is defined as anything that does not as add

value to the final product. Excess inventory is regarded as waste since no

value is added by stoking up inventory. In addition, inventories takes up

space, tie down capital, incurs storage cost, as well as security and insurance

costs; not to mention the risk of damage during storage as well as the risk of

obsolescence.


The JIT concept therefore calls for zero inventory or buffer stocks. Waiting

time, inspection time and time spent at rectifying defects deemed wasteful.

Thus, getting things done the first “time right” is another doctrine of the JIT

concept.

4. Total Quality Control (TQC)

Production operations can be proceed in the JIT and the fashion only if the

part delivered are the of good enough quality for the use. Rejection of

materials due to poor quality will grievously disrupts the whole production

workflow and schedule. Any savings and productivity gains from JIT will be

wiped away. Hence, the JIT concept must also encompass the total Quality

Control concept for smooth, just-in-time execution of the work processes.

5. Uninterrupted work flow

JIT production warrants an interrupted work process. Since each workstation

pulls materials from the previous one, without keeping any backup inventory,

any disruption at any point in the production line would impact the entire

chain of activities, it is therefore, essential to ensure that the manufacturing

process is uninterrupted. Simplifying the work processes and striving to

reduce the process set-up time are useful ways to better ensure continuous

operations.

6. Supplier relation: single-sourcing

With materials flowing into the factory on a JIT basis, coordination with

suppliers is utmost importance in order to ensure that the right materials

come at the right time. Too many suppliers will cause management to have

less time with each supplier for liaising, expediting orders, and feedback and

coordination efforts. JIT therefore emphasizes on the need to reduce the pool

of supplier and, eventually, work towards a single supply source. This

requires the forging of long term business relationship founded on mutual

trust and benefits. The single supplier, with assured business over the long

term, will then be able to invest in machinery and automation to improve

productivity and reduce costs.


This is, in turn, works well for the production company as the supplier is able

to supply better quality materials and at the lower cost. It would be easier to

manage smaller group of suppliers. Manager will be able to spend more

quality time with the reduce number of suppliers. Managers will be able to

spend more quality time with the reduce number of suppliers and ensure that

the JIT production is well supported by all the crucial JIT deliveries.


CHAPTER 2

JIT IN MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY

2.0 Just-In-Time (JIT) and Its Implementation in Automobile

Manufacturing Industry

JIT is one of the examples of early-landed future manufacturing idealism that

requires continuous collaborated refinements throughout its supply chain elements.

It has been used since 1950s by Japanese automotive industries and yet, according

to Karlsson (1994), none of the most developed countries would have even

considered this methodology until early 1980s. Researchers tried really hard to

explain JIT concept in a short descriptive sentence and none of them were able to

come up with a single answer that represents everyone’s definitions. Those who

were trying to bring them together were ended up with another new more complex

definition. JIT goes beyond ordinary management theory or a company’s

manufacturing procedures; it comprises production planning, HRM, material

management, distribution, customer services not only involving individual

organisation furthermore requires collaborated cross-companies dedication to

continuously refine the business process of one and another.

Svensson (2001) in his journal argued that the basic of JIT is “no non-

essential activity should be committed prior, during and after any production

phases and wherever beneficial outsourcing is regarded as good as in-house

production”. JIT is understood as event driven production concept which has been

carefully planned and structured to ensure all its components are ready whenever

needed. It is also known as inventory-less production method which allows

minimum stock level only needed for the current manufacturing phase.

Automotive manufacturing industry has become an ideal instance on how JIT

methodology may improve the efficiency of the whole production processes

(Karlsson, 1994). By involving thousands manufacturing steps, there are always

chances for refinement.


This is to minimize lead times which in turn will boost the production capacity of the

industry as well as its flexibility to response to the market needs. Since this

industry requires large stock to meet the production needs, a better inventory

management system such as JIT will be helpful in reducing costs (Claycomb, 1999).

Ramarapu (1995) stated that, most authors agreed that successful JIT

implementation requires five key elements to be considered.

• Waste reduction: This element’s aim is to eliminate all non-value-added tasks

(Bowen, 1998). The main problem with traditional production method is

resulting from the focus on producing large number of items. With level of

competitiveness and flexibility requirements, this is no longer an appropriate

method to be performed.

• Value-adding production oriented: This element brings the terminology of

“pull-system” which allow customer order to trigger the production process.

Pull system requires immediate respond in order to satisfy customer

requirement therefore avoiding “the goal of producing large batches”

(Bowen, 1998). By grouping products based on their production process

similarity, manufacturer may also add-value to the products by lessening

production complexity, shortening travel and idle time.

• Customer participation in quality improvement: In every business, customer

will have the final say therefore the success of the business can be

determined based on customer satisfaction. This element heavily emphasis

the needs of customer involvement in product development and delivery

(Bowen, 1998). Customer may also be included in development team to

direct them to the right manufacturing plan.

• Employee empowerment: Empowering employees mean dividing problem

solving and decision making responsibilities from management level to its

individual team directly related with the task. With careful planning and

adequate team work, this element will increase quality, productivity and

flexibility of the manufacturing process (Bowen, 1998).


• Vendor/supplier integration: Undoubtedly, specialized suppliers will normally

produce a better product since they can concentrate in a particular thing. By

outsourcing to those suppliers, a company will be able to put all its time and

resources in its core function which in turn will improve the quality of the

final products (Ramarapu, 1995).

2.1 Ford KA In Just In Time

Production of Ford latest small car, the Ford KA has been a dramatic

improvement compared to Ford previous product, Fiesta (Kochan, 1997). This is a

real example of successful JIT implementation with all its outsourcing strategies.

The production target of 1,100 KA cars per day has been reached only within 8

weeks since the launch date, compared to 15 weeks required for Fiesta. Ford found

that the initial bottleneck was caused by material handling, assembly time and

inbound logistic. Some of the components in Fiesta are supplied by various

suppliers and these components had to be made, loaded in the container and

scheduled for delivery before finally delivered by trucks. This common process is

found to be inefficient as every part has to be continuously handled by human and

this causes big risks of damages, misplaced and imperfection in quality, especially

for cosmetically sensitive and fragile parts such as instrument consoles, electrical

wiring and airbags.

With the new developed JIT system supported with sophisticated aerial

tunnels connecting Ford with its suppliers, production lead times can be minimised,

product quality can be improved, responsiveness towards customer demands can

me boosted and the most important thing is inventory, space requirements,

handling and transportation cost can be dramatically reduced (Kochan, 1997). Ford

is now connected with more than 50 suppliers in Valencia with specifically designed

aerial tunnels. These tunnels are also very useful to transport bulky and heavy

items such as seats and fuel tank. The brain of this amazing system is DAD (direct

automated delivery) which will integrate the whole processes virtually as one

extended manufacturing warehouse.


DAD will enable a smooth manufacturing process by applying Ford scheduling

system so that all the supplied components being delivered right on time they are

needed. In addition, DAD and its tunnels enable the integration of manufacturing

equipment so that the component being delivered can be immediately installed with

the main body or other components in Ford factory. Summary of

Ford Valencia manufacturing system prior JIT implementation:

• Minimum of 15 weeks to reach full production capacity

• Required at least 3,000 parts to be assembled for each car

• Very small outsourcing involve for car components

• All parts from suppliers are delivered on trucks

• Stock must be kept at certain level to assure the continuity of production

• Parts are often damaged during packaging, handling or delivery

• Spent over $6 million for inefficient delivery system (250+ trucks per day)

• 80 per cent automation in overall

• Manual seats and battery placement and this may cause injury for employee

In a dynamic market trends, pre-JIT system clearly is not responsive enough

as an answer. There are minor inefficiencies throughout the system which

accumulate into serious problem that may cause Ford being less competitive in the

market.

2.1.1 Improvement Process Analysis

The main objectives of JIT are obtaining low-cost high quality products and

on-time production as well as eliminating waste and stagnant stock (Svensson,

2001). Even though most of JIT implementation has similar aim and purposes, the

strategies involved may differ from industry to industry or company to company.

Ford has smartly chosen the right methods and strategies by reducing the barriers

in relation with its suppliers.

Through JIT, Ford is achieving the highest efficiency in car manufacturing

industry. Its plant in Valencia has become the standard and being adopted in its

other plants in many other countries. Apart from its tangible benefits such as


saving on transport costs, stock/inventory costs, quicker manufacturing process

and minimized risk/wastage, JIT will also bring immediate intangible benefits such

as improved customer satisfaction through immediate responses and shorter

timeframe to respond towards market trends.

Improvements being achieved through JIT implementation:

• Only 8 weeks required to reach full production capacity

• Only 1,200 parts need to be assembled, the rest have been done by its

suppliers

• All the outsource-viable production parts are outsourced

• Automatic delivery system and aerial tunnels are developed to minimise

transport

• There is barely any stock required as most parts are made to order

• The whole manufacturing process including the suppliers are working as one

system

• The need of conventional truck delivery is minimum

• 98 percent automation

• Seats and battery placement are being done by automated high-precision

machines.

There is not enough detail to measure the benefit of JIT implementation

against the pre-JIT system, however from rough analysis Ford will gain the benefit

immediately and get the investment back in virtually no time.


2.1.2 JIT Cost/Benefit Analysis for Ford Valencia

COSTS BENEFITS

� Extending outsourcing

(losing control)

� $500 million pilot plan and

analysis

� Speed-up production process 8weeks

� Smaller number or manufacturing

parts

� Concentrating on core business

functions

� 25% shorter time production time

needed

� Accuracy of production on plan

� Building aerial tunnels

� Setup Direct Automated

Delivery DAD

� $16 million delivery system

� Less handling = less damages / costs

� Less conventional transport

dependent

� Time saving

� Manufacturing seamless integration

� Further interest from more suppliers

� Saving $6+ million per year on

transport

Figure 1: Cost and Benefits of JIT Implementation in Ford Valencia.


CHAPTER 3

JIT IN CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

3.0 Application of JIT in Construction Industry : An Introduction

Much had been discussed on raising the productivity level of the construction

industry which consistently lagged behind other sectors of the economy. The use of

buildable designs was singled out as a means to improve productivity. In so far as

construction management is concerned, the Just-In-Time (JIT) philosophy can be

applied for logistics management on worksites to help raise productivity levels

(Akintoye, 1995).

The JIT philosophy originates from the manufacturing sector. It helps to

smoothen the production process through the efficient handling of materials, i.e. by

providing the right materials, in the right quantities and quality, just in time for

production. Given the very different conditions in the construction setting, it is

inevitable that modifications have to be made to some of the JIT principles where

application is concerned (Low and Chan, 1997). Nevertheless, both the

manufacturing and construction industries require active movement of materials

from the suppliers to the production area in both the factory and the worksite. With

the JIT management system in place, materials may be delivered to site on the

actual day of use or just the day before (Lim and Low, 1992).

Explorative studies have been completed in recent years to see how JIT can

be applied into the construction industry to reap the benefits of the system. Most of

these studies have concluded that it is possible to apply the techniques of JIT in the

construction industry with some modifications. Given the very different conditions

in the construction setting, it is inevitable that modifications have to be made to

some of the JIT principles where application is concerned (Low and Chan, 1997).


Nevertheless, both the manufacturing and construction industries require

active movement of materials from the suppliers to the production area in both the

factory and the worksite. With the JIT management system in place, materials may

be delivered to site on the actual day of use or just the day before (Lim and Low,

1992).

Therefore, in this chapter, the discussion will view on the application of JIT in

construction whether this approach can be applied on the construction industry.

3.1 Factors That Influence Housing Developers to use JIT concept in

Construction Industry

The successful implementation of JIT is dependent on the suppliers’ flexibility,

users’ stability, total management and employee commitment as well as teamwork.

Through the elimination of waste, JIT aims to improve product quality and

productivity. Waste is considered as non-value adding to an activity. In any

operation, it comprises motion and work. However, only work is a value-adding

activity. Hence, motion is regarded as a form of waste. Wastes include over-

production of components and products, delays in materials and information,

material transportation, unnecessary processing, excess stocks, unnecessary

human activities and defects in material and information. The seven principles of

JIT used to overcome the above problems are now outlined.

(a) Elimination of waste

The fundamental philosophy of JIT is to eliminate waste and under the JIT concept,

construction waste can be classified into the following categories:

1. Waste from over-production

2. Waste from delays

3. Waste from transportation

4. Waste from unnecessary processing

5. Waste from excess inventory


6. Waste from unnecessary motion

7. Waste from defects.

Construction is schedule driven. Given a well-structured schedule, if

everyone stays on their part of the schedule, the work flows smoothly and

maximum performance is achieved. However, as we all know, it is rare that

projects perform precisely to their original schedule. Business conditions change,

deliveries slip, a design requires correction, etc. If a schedule has sufficient slack in

the impacted activities, changes may not impact end dates. When there is little or

no slack, players are pressured to make it up in accelerated production.

3.1.1 Types of Construction Buffers

There are two types of inventories that can serve the function of buffering

downstream construction processes from flow variation. The most familiar type is

piles of stuff; materials, tools, equipment, manpower, etc. These piles of stuff may

originate in decisions to insert certain time intervals between scheduled activities,

e.g. between fabrication and installation of pipe spools. Consequently, while they

take the form of stuff, they often also represent time added to project duration, so

it call these as "schedule buffers".

Less familiar are inventories of workable assignments, produced by planning

processes that make work ready for downstream production These buffer by

enabling a reliable, predictable flow of output from each process. They need not

imply the existence of piles of stuff, depending upon the predictability of flow

between supplier and customer processes. It will call these inventories of workable

assignments "plan buffers."


3.1.2 Functions of Schedule Buffers

In the construction of process plants (petroleum, chemical, food processing,

pulp and paper, etc), projects are frequently fast track; i.e. construction begins

before design is completed. Late delivery of drawings and materials has led

construction contractors to demand earlier delivery, reducing the time available for

engineering to complete design, resulting in more delivery problems and demands

for even earlier deliveries.

This is clearly a vicious circle. Large schedule buffers between suppliers and

construction may shield the contractor from the impact of late deliveries, but does

nothing to address the root causes of variation. Further, the shielding is expensive,

both in time and money. There is a better way. A suggested rule: Place schedule

buffers just after processes with variable output. For example, that suggests placing

schedule buffers between engineering and fabrication, rather than between

fabrication and installation. The fabrication and delivery processes are highly

predictable, unless drawings are incorrect or incomplete, or drawings are pulled out

of fabrication to be revised.

A schedule buffer in front of fabrication would provide more time for

engineering to complete its work and do it correctly. It would also provide the

fabricator an opportunity to select and bundle work to meet his needs for

production efficiency and the contractor's needs for quantities and sequence.


Another suggested rule: Size schedule buffers to the degree of uncertainty and

variation to be managed. Research has shown that schedule buffers are sized

without regard to the toughness of projects; i.e. their level of uncertainty. This

amounts to wasting time and money accumulating piles of stuff not all of which is

needed

3.1.3 Functions of Plan Buffers

Schedule buffers do not replace plan buffers. Plan buffers are necessary even

when schedule buffers are in place because having a pile of pipe does not provide a

piping crew with workable assignments. Pipe spools must match with valves,

controls, hangers, etc. Structures for supporting the pipe must be in place.

Preferably, the spools that can be installed are those that should come next in an

optimum constructability sequence. Assembling physical components, reserving

shared resources, determining optimum sequencing, and sizing assignments to

absorb the productive capacity of the crew is best done prior to making

assignments and committing to what work will be done in the plan period, usually

one week.

Plan buffers, sometimes called backlogs of workable assignments, are the

outputs of make ready processes. They determine what CAN be done as distinct

from what SHOULD be done. Obviously, commitment to what WILL be done next

week can only come from CAN, regardless of the pressure for production and the

need to make up schedule slippages. The common practice of pressuring for

production regardless of CAN is rooted in a theory of construction project

management that disregards capability and management of flows in favor of

schedule push and management of contracts. By monitoring the match of DID with

WILL using the measurement of PPC, the percentage of planned activities

completed, and acting on the root causes of non-completions, we can learn how to

produce better plans and how to do what we plan to do. The implications for work

flow, project durations and productivity are enormous. Think of the complete

construction process, from engineering through installation and start-up, as a

complex of work processes, with work flowing from one to the next. When a

downstream process attempts to plan its work and determine the resources it will


need, it may have shielded itself from unreliable inflow using piles of stuff or

schedule spacing. However, it only needs those piles of stuff if supplier processes

cannot reliably do what they say they are going to do. If supplier processes

consistently achieve PPCs near 100%, customer processes can plan their work and

match resources to it. Reduction of schedule buffers and better matching of

resources to work flow both contribute to reduction of project time and cost.


(b) The Kanban or Pull System

Methods of production can generally be organized in two ways, namely the pull

and the push system. In the pull system, organizations produce on demand

whereas in the push system, organizations forecast the demand or maintain stock

level. The advantage of the push system is that since the amount of production is

known in advance, the scheduling of activities needed is predictable. However, a

forecast may be required and therefore there is a possibility of over-production. The

advantage of the pull system is that it is less dependent on estimates when

compared to the push system. However, in the Kanban system, responding to

unexpected demands is not possible.

(c) Uninterrupted workflow

Uninterrupted workflow means that the schedule for the final assembly must be

smooth flowing. Hence, rationalization and simplification of the production process

is necessary. Every process should be reduced to its simplest form before

considering mechanization or automation and the aim is to replace a complex and

expensive process with one that is simple and cheap.

(d) Total Quality Control (TQC)

In order to achieve zero inventories, errors and defective components must be

eliminated in each task. Under TQC, all workers are responsible for ensuring that

their work is defect-free before proceeding to the next stage of operation.

(e) Employee involvement

As noted earlier, the success of JIT implementation is dependent to a great

extent on the teamwork and commitment of every employee. Each employee

should be given adequate training and responsibilities in various areas like

timeliness of production and quality assurance. Employees should be able to set up

and maintain various type of machinery. Involvement can be extended to

suggestion schemes and participation in quality improvement teams.


(f) Supplier relations

Building a good supplier-user relation is no longer a choice but a necessity. The

quality of the supplies purchased is a critical factor to the quality of an

organisation’s finished products. Hence, an organization must treat suppliers as

long-term business partners so that the quality of materials delivered will always be

maintained at a high standard. This would greatly reduce paperwork, inventory

levels and storage space.

(g) Continuous improvement

An organization should not remain content with its status quo. To maintain its

competitiveness, it should continuously strive to improve operations and the ways

in which activities are carried out. Audits and benchmarking are some of the tools

which an organization can adopt to ensure that its operations are improved

continuously.

The successful implementation of JIT would require a consideration of the seven

principles mentioned above. Once this is achieved, the advantages of implementing

JIT would include:

• Reduction in inventory level (work-in-progress and raw material)

• Reduction in storage space

• Reduction in factory overheads

• Reduction in production costs

• Reduction in rectification works

• Improvement in quality

• Improvement in productivity (Low and Chan, 1997a)


3.2 Challenges in Implementing JIT in Construction

In reality the application of JIT on construction differs from manufacturing

industry due to its characteristic. The different characteristics exist for the

both industries are in context of different types of production, and because

of the greater complexity and uncertainty of construction. There are several

reasons why the construction industry becomes uncertain and complex. The

construction industry involves a lot of people with different of body knowledge,

skills and experiences. Furthermore, the parties involved in the construction

industry have their own objectives and target to be achieved in certain period of

time. The situation becomes harder because a single actor’s action, ideas and egos

at every stages of construction development may bring different effects to the

whole project. Beside of multiple participants in construction development, the

number of parts, relative lack of standardization and constraining factors easily

make the construction of an automobile factory more difficult than the production of

an automobile in that factory. When this complexity is joined with economic

pressures to minimize time and cost that uncertainty arises in construction is not

surprising.

In Manufacturing , Ohno, in order to allow a downstream process continued working

when a feeder process failed, he has removed the safety stock by minimizing the

inventories between the processes. When the problems occur during the production

process, Ohno required the operators to stop the work if they are unable to fix that

problems.

Logically, it is necessary to fix the problems rather than simply passing bad

product down the line. The problems which arise also became highly visible because

it may result in line stoppages. Forced confrontation with problems together with

analysis to root causes produced a progressively more streamlined and smoother

running production process, with fewer end-of the-line defects and higher

throughput.

How might this concept work in construction? As mentioned earlier in this

chapter, the construction development is a complex task. Therefore, it must be well


organized by the management in order to achieve the maximum performance in the

project. However, the well structured schedule provided by the

management is not only the one key factor of project successful. The other

party should stay on their part of the schedule in order to have a smooth work flow

and minimize the problems during the whole process of construction project. In

reality, it is rare that the projects perform precisely to their original schedule. This

situation happened due to changes on internal and external factors related

to construction development, such as business conditions change,

deliveries slip; a design requires correction, etc.

The changes made by the parties may not impact the end dates if the original

schedule has sufficient slack in the impacted activities. The situation will be

different compared to the construction project which is the schedule has a little or

no slack. The players are pressured to make it up in accelerated production. In fact,

this situation may caused delay to construction project which is could bring waste

of times, money, energy, man power and etc. In order to implement the application

of JIT, the priority objective of this application is to eliminate or minimized the

variation and wastage. By the fact show above, is it possible to implement

the JIT on construction?

As we know, the construction industry is also known as 3d’s industry;

danger, dirty and demand. This discussion will concern on the part of dirty because

this item has relation with JIT philosophy.

For an example, in 1998, the Environmental Protection Agency of United

States of America estimated that 136 million tons of building-related waste is

generated in the U.S. annually, which is 25% to 40% of the national solid waste

stream. A 2003 update shows an increase to 164,000 million tons annually, of

which 9% is construction waste, 38% is renovation waste, and 53% is demolition

debris. This situation shows us increasing of construction waste in certain period of

time. This figure is only in U.S. and it is believed that the other countries have also

faced this problems.


Can we imagine that how much more our land can afford for construction

waste? The disposal of the construction waste need a large scale of land whereas all

over the world faced a shortage of land in order to fulfill the demand of

accommodation, agriculture, manufacturing, education and etc. C&D waste disposal

triggers a sequence of adverse effects that are not always apparent to building

professionals. These include the loss of useful property, wasted materials and

embodied energy, greenhouse gas generation, and environmental stressors

associated with producing new materials instead of using existing materials. The

number of C&D landfills is declining, which means fewer disposal options, greater

hauling distances, and increased fuel consumption and vehicle emissions. Capping,

closing, and monitoring landfills, and cleaning up leaking or contaminated landfill

sites drain public funds.

So far it is clear to us that, the implementation of JIT on construction

seems unclear because any application of any method not only just all

about take the whole method from other industry and then simplify

implement it into the construction industry. The construction industry is

complex and uncertain. It needs a lot of improvement in many aspects such as,

efficient management of waste materials, co-ordination between parties, well-

planned management and etc. the discussion above about the waste materials is

absolutely adverse from the priority of the objective of JIT application.

For the fast track construction of process plants such as petroleum, chemical,

food processing, pulp and paper, etc, frequently the construction begins before

design is completed. Therefore the contractors demand to have earlier delivery

which is reducing the time available for engineering to complete the structure

drawings. These situations exist due to late delivery of drawings and materials and

it is possible caused more delivery problems and demands for even earlier

deliveries. In order to avoid or shield the contractors from the impact of late

delivery, the management may provide a large schedule buffer between the

suppliers and construction. However, it does nothing to address the root cause of

variation in construction projects. Even more, the shield is expensive for time and

money.


Therefore, recommended rule has been suggested by Glenn and Gregory.

They suggest of placement of schedule buffers just after processes with variable

output. For example, the management placed the schedule buffers between

engineering and fabrication, rather than between fabrication and installation. The

fabrication and delivery processes are highly predictable, unless drawings are

incorrect or incomplete, or drawings are pulled out of fabrication to be revised. The

engineers have the sufficient time to complete its work and do it correctly if there is

a schedule buffer in front of fabrication. It is not just good for the engineers but

also to fabricators which is they have an opportunity to select and bundle work to

meet his needs for production efficiency and the contractor's needs for quantities

and sequence

Sizing the schedule buffers to the degree of uncertainty and variation to be

managed is another recommendation from Glenn and Gregory. Research has shown

that schedule buffers are sized without regard to the toughness of projects; i.e.

their level of uncertainty.

The other challenge of implementation of JIT on construction is about the

supply chain. As we know, the industrial supply chains in manufacturing industries

often have a long-term horizon rahter than the practice of competitive bidding in

the construction industry ensures that every new project means a new constellation

of partners. The long-lasting supply chains of the manufacturing sphere means the

members of the chains optimize their operations with each other to deliver the best

possible product at least costs to the end customer.

For the members, the incentives structure direct them toward viewing the

supply chain as one integrated chain competing with other supply chains and

success is ensured by making one own supply chain the best one. For actors in the

construction industry, every project is a one-off happening where the incentive

structure motivates them to make the most profit out of each project. This

discontinuity is detrimental to construction project productivity and can probably

only be changed by altering the practices of how “construction chains” are


composed. A possibility for the construction industry could be to aim at more

lasting relations between the actors in both the value chain of materials and in the

value chain of actors.

Why the supply chain so important in JIT? In manufacturing industries, the

operation is based on the long-term production and keep produce the same product

as long as they have demand from their customers. Therefore, as long as they keep

produce their product that’s mean they keep using the same suppliers for their

production. This is important to have co-ordination with the same suppliers because

the manufactures of production already know the quality of workmanship of their

supplier and what are characteristics of their suppliers. Meanwhile, differs exist in

supply chain of construction as mentioned earlier. The short term of supply chain in

construction has caused the uncertainty.

New projects mean new consultants, contractors and suppliers. Changes of

parties in every projects caused the relationship between those parties is just for

short period. That’s mean for new projects, everybody needs to know each other

again which is everybody did not know how their job are, what quality of work they

can produce and other aspects which can give different effects to the construction

projects.

The long-term relation with the supplier also plays a big factor in effecting

the construction project. The good track record of supplier should be recommended

for other construction project in order to achieve the objectives of the projects.

However, it is rarely happened in construction industry because it involves other

factors such as transportation, limited materials and etc. Therefore, in order to run

a construction projects within the available budget, the management have to avoid

any extra expenses especially in context of getting the right materials and amount

from the suppliers. This situation related to another concept of JIT; producing the

right part in the right place and the right time.

So, it is important to ensure that the supplier can produce the right part of

materials as been asked in contract and also they can guarantee that they can

supply the materials on the right time. However, even the suppliers can supply the


materials on the right times, the construction site must have efficient place to store

the materials to avoid any damages which caused extra expanses. Even more, the

delivery of the materials from suppliers is much depends on the transportation

which may involve unexpected traffic. From this view, it shows that a lot of things

need to put into consideration in implementing the application of JIT on

construction industry.

3.3 Problem Areas in Construction Industry

From the presentation paper by Veiseth, Rostad and Andersen (2003) the actors

that they have interviewed have identified several problem-areas. In this paper we

will focus on three of them:

• The problems in the interface between the builder, the advisers and the

executors. This problem is often referred to as “early phase- problems” that

emphasize the whole project.

• Logistics problems for building materials and other products used during the

construction process.

• Problems in the construction project planning and management.

Most of the actors we have interviewed argue that the problems in a typical

construction project come into being in the interface between the builder, the

advisers and the executors (see figure 1). The advisers are the architect and the

consulting engineers, while the executors are the building contractors and

supporters.

Builder

Advisers

Executors


Fig 2: Problem area; the interface between the builder, the advisers and the

executors Builder Advisers Executors

In their opinion they interfaces are of a special interest because much of the

premises for the ensuing productivity and logistics are created here. The problems

could be due to several things like communications problems between different

professions and cultures and that the architects are thinking too little about the

building process in their drawings. But the thing we will point out is that the actors

in the three categories, most of the times do vary from project to project. This is in

contrast to e.g. manufacturing industries where the bindings between actors in e.g.

a supply chain are more often a long-term relationship. Furthermore, in the very

beginning of a typical project, in the idea-phase, it is often just the builder and the

architect who are participating. This can maybe also explain the fact that many of

our respondents claiming that there often are a lack of technical expertise in this

phase.

When it comes to logistics planning it seems to be a potential for improvements

in both the planning of how to organize the construction site and of the logistic of

the building itself. For the logistic of the construction site, a well-known problem is

that equipment and construction goods are delivered or placed at wrong

geographical places and not on time. This could be the result of defective storage

planning or that a storage plan does not exist at all together with lack of routines

for the receiving of goods (e.g. logistics planning). The result of this is also that

many building sites look much disorganized. The inability by the contractor to

deliver materials at the right time and the right place is identified as one of the

most common problems in the construction industry (Thomas, Horman, de Souza

and Zavriski (2002:2).

Another impotent area is purchase routines. Today, most of the purchases are

done by telephone, even though most of the interviewed actor’s wish to do most of

this through the Internet. This could be due to that many are not familiar with a

computer.


More Internet-based purchase routines are believed to be more cost-efficient

than telephone-based purchase, for instance to help decrease the normally huge

numbers of rush orders, which is looked upon as a problem. Those of the

interviewed subjects who have carried out the change from telephone to more

automated purchasing routines support this.

Planning has always been a theme when it comes to improvements of the

productivity in all businesses, and the construction industry is no exception. Several

actors in the industry emphasize that projects are behind schedule due to that

plans are not finished in time. In addition, plans that also take care of the interfaces

between the actors in the project are often missing. The interviewed actors in the

Norwegian construction industry do specially mention insufficient planning

regarding detail plans. Several do also want more milestones and better overview

of dependencies in their projects. It is nevertheless important to realize that there

is no point to “over-plan” the projects. An identified trend in the construction

industry is that the actors only plan what is within their own field of expertise and

disregards planning of elements/factors outside their own domain.

Insufficient planning could also be due to that the project management in

construction projects could have been better. Furthermore, the respondents

especially single out the technical project management. Many claim that the plans

consist of too few subsidiary goals and that the project management should control

the projects more strictly. This relates especially to the project and the project

management’s ability to meet the deadlines in form of the milestones.

A typical problem, pointed out by many of the interviewed subjects, is that a lot

of actors are utilizing the slack in the plans completely, i.e. never starts work until

they really have to start to reach the deadline. This leads to that the project

decreases its possibilities to catch up for unforeseen problems.

Another aspect pointed out is the meeting-procedures: How often should the

different meetings be held, who should participate and how should the meetings be

structured. This could be the reason why some claims that many decisions are

taken too late and that they often to fuzzy.


3.4 Solution and Recommendation : Strategy for Construction JIT

The desire of JIT is elimination of physical buffers (materials or time)

between production processes, and the achievement of one piece flow within

processes. Ohno successfully eliminates such in-process inventories because

production scheduling provided sufficiently stable coordination of flows compared to

unstable of construction scheduling. Therefore, we cannot simplify eliminate the

physical buffers because the first thing before come to this step is attacking the

causes and uncertainty in construction. Even though manufacturing and

construction share the same ultimate objective of reducing variation and waste,

their strategies for achieving that objective must be different.

The strategy recommended by Glenn and Gregory in implementation of JIT in

construction are:

1) Better Location and Sizing of Schedule Buffers

• Will require developing better assessments of project uncertainty and

determining the quantitative relationship between buffers and the

uncertainty they are intended to buffer. It will also require experimentation

with relocating schedule buffers, to test the principle of locating buffers just

behind processes that are the source of flow variation.

2) Place Plan Buffers and Make Ready Processes Ahead of Each

Production Process

the Last Planner (LP) initiative, has been described in some detail in previous

papers . Although it has been experimentally tested in both the United States and

South America (Venezuela), it may be helpful to consider it as a research

hypothesis.

Hypothesis: Production can be shielded from upstream uncertainty through

planning.


Benefits of the Research: The Last Planner method of detailed production

planning shields production from upstream uncertainty thus improving productivity,

revealing sources of uncertainty and variation, releasing resources for further

improving performance "behind the shield," and providing a highly predictable near-

term work flow to downstream processes.

Methodology:

• Solicit engineering and construction projects from industry.

• Evaluate the crew/squad level planning systems of each

• Help participants conform their systems to the Last Planner Model.

• Develop measurements of comparative productivity

• Before and after LP

• Between LP and non-LP

• Collect measurement data; i.e. percent planned assignments completed,

planned productivity, and actual productivity.

• Analyze measurement data and test hypothesis

Characteristics of the Last Planner Method:

• Written weekly work plans for each front line supervisor and work group.

• Assignments drawn from a backlog of workable assignments created by

screening for constraints and by acquiring necessary resources.

• Assignments expressed at the level of detail necessary for screening -Weekly

work plans sized to target productivity.

• Front line supervisors participate in the selection and sizing of assignments,

provide reasons why planned work was not done, -Craft

superintendents/Discipline supervisors see that others act on reasons

beyond the reach of the craft or discipline.

3) Progressively Replace Schedule Buffers with Plan Buffers

The long term goal of replacing schedule buffers with plan buffers.

Hypothesis: Work flow variation can be reduced.


Benefits of the Research:

1) Project duration can be reduced by reducing the buffers between EPC functions,

and buffer sizes can be reduced if work flow variation can be reduced. 2) If work

flow can be made more predictable, labor and other resources can be better

matched to work flow, thus improving productivity.

Methodology:

Phase I: Identify and analyze examples of successful efforts (tools and techniques)

to increase the predictability of work flow.

Phase II: Test tools and techniques in experiments sponsored by industry

members.

Examples of Tools and Techniques:

• Developing more accurate assessments of project uncertainty.

• Adjusting schedules using work packages and milestone screening. station,

until limits of predictability are met. Act on constraints to push back limits.

• Buying information to extend the accuracy and range of forecast deliveries.

• Producing more advance warning of changes in design, -Integrating supplier

and customer schedules at the item (e.g. isometric)

3.5 Conclusion

In order to achieve advancement in construction JIT, it is permitted to develop new

tools and techniques by demonstrate techniques and industry research to test the

theories. As mentioned earlier, the construction and manufacturing are different

types of production. However, the application of JIT is still applicable to

construction in which physical buffers may ultimately be replaced by better

managing uncertainty and eliminating the causes of flow variation. As the

implementation of plan buffers propagates certainty throughout projects,

productivity will improve from better matching labor to work flow, and project

durations will shorten as physical buffers shrink with the flow variation they are

designed to absorb.


For instance, In Denmark, Bertelsen (1995) reported a 10 per cent increase in

productivity in the first phase of a social housing project that experimented with the

use of the JIT philosophy in building logistics; the second phase of the project

resulted in an average 7per cent increase in productivity. It was also noted that

savings were not evenly distributed among the participants and that the project

itself was not delivered at a lower price.

The rationale for this study is to see application of Just in Time (JIT) in

construction industry. In this context, the JIT philosophy appears to hold

tremendous potentials for improving the movement of construction site.

The space constraints for storage and the traffic congestion at the worksite can

then be alleviated.


CHAPTER 4

JIT : AN OVERVIEW OF IBS

4.0 JIT and IBS

The term ‘Just-In-Time’ (JIT), used for instance to describe the delivery of

materials to a construction site, suggests that materials will be brought to their

location for final installation and be installed immediately upon arrival without

incurring any delay due to storage in a laydown or staging area. JIT is a concept

developed by the Japanese who created the Toyota Production System, later

translated into English as the lean production system. The ultimate objective of

JIT production is to supply the right materials at the right time and in the

right amount at every step in the process.

Thus, IBS is one example of JIT in construction. Rahman and Omar (2006)

defined IBS as a construction system that is built using pre-fabricated components.

The manufacturing of the components is systematically done using machine,

formworks and other forms of mechanical equipment.

IBS is defined as products, systems and techniques used in making

construction less labour-oriented, faster as well as quality controlled. It generally

involves prefabricated products, factory manufactured elements that transported to

the construction sites and erected. (Shaari, Bulletin Ingénieur, 2003)

According to Abraham Warszawski (1999), IBS is defined as a set of element

or component which is inter-related towards helping the implementation of

construction works activities. He also expounded that an industrialisation process is

an investment in equipment, facilities, and technology with the objective of

maximising production output, minimising labour resource, and improving quality

while a building system is defined as a set of interconnected element that joint

together to enable the designated performance of a building.


4.1 Classification of IBS

According to Badir- Razali, generally, there are four types of building systems

currently available in Malaysia’s building system classification (Badir et al. 1998),

namely conventional, cast in-situ, prefabricated and composite building systems.

Each building system is represented by its respective construction method which is

further characterised by its construction technology, functional and geometrical

configuration.

Fig. 3 : Type of building system in Malaysia


Nonetheless, according to CIDB (2003), the structural aspects of IBS of the

systems, divided into five major types as follows:

1. Precast Concrete Framing, Panel and Box Systems

Precast columns, beams, slabs, 3-D components (balconies, staircases,

toilets, lift chambers), permanent concrete formwork, etc;

Precast concrete wall

2. Steel Formwork Systems

Tunnel forms, beams and columns molding forms, permanent steel

formworks (metal decks, etc;

Steel formwork system


3. Steel Framing Systems

Steel beams and columns, portal frames, roof trusses, etc;

Steel roof trusses

4. Prefabricated Timber Framing Systems

Timber frames, roof trusses, etc;

Prefabricated timber framing system for a double storey house.


5. Block Work Systems

Interlocking concrete masonry units (CMU), lightweight concrete blocks,

etc.

Lightweight concrete blocks are used for wall construction

The pre-cast concrete components are among the most common

prefabricated elements that are available both locally and abroad. The pre-cast

concrete elements are concrete products that are manufactured and cured in a

plant environment and then transported to a job site for installation. The elements

are columns, beams, slabs, walls, 3-D elements (balconies, staircase, toilets, and

lift chambers), permanent concrete formwork and etc.

The steel formwork is prefabricated in the factory and then installed on site.

However the steel reinforcement and services conduit are installed on site before

the steel formwork are installed. The installation of this formwork is easy by using

simple bracing system. Then concrete is poured into the formwork and after seven

days, the formwork can be removed and there is some system whereby the

formwork served as a part of the structure itself after concreting. The steel

formwork systems are used in tunnel forms, beams, column moulding forms and

permanent steel formworks.


The elements of steel framing system are rolled into the specific sizes and

then the elements are fabricated that involves cutting, drilling, shot blasting,

welding and painting. Fabricated elements are sent to the construction site to be

then erected whereby welding and the tightening of bolts at joints are conducted.

The elements include steel beams and columns, portal frames and roof trusses.

The prefabricated timber framing system is normally used in the conventional

roof truss and timber frames. The timber is prefabricated by joining the members of

the truss by using steel plate. It is important that all members are treated with the

anti pest chemical. Then, the installation is done on site by connecting the

prefabricated roof truss to the reinforcement of the roof beams.

The elements of block work system include interlocking concrete masonry

units (CMU) and lightweight concrete blocks.

The elements are fabricated and cured in the factory. The elements are

normally used as bricks in structures and interlocking concrete block pavement.

3.2 Value Stream Mapping

Koskela (1992) pointed out that architects, engineers, and construction

practitioners have for the longest time focused on conversion activities and

overlooked issues of flow. Flow is important because work or materials that do not

flow sit idle in inventory, tying up money (including the procurement cost of

ingredients plus labor and machine time to bring them to the stage of completion

they are in) as well as space. They stand the risk of being damaged or becoming

obsolete due to design changes or market competition. Inventory means product

waits: its cycle time increases, that is, it takes longer for the product to traverse all

production steps it needs to go through before reaching its customer. As a result,

project durations are larger than they would have been had flow not been inhibited.


Most tools used today by practitioners who manage construction, such as

those fordesign, planning, scheduling, and costing, do not acknowledge flow: they

do not explicitly capture changes of resource characteristics over time. Process

modeling tools for discrete event simulation are an important exception and

warrant more attention by the lean construction community. Such models can

incorporate input regarding individuallycharacterized components, uncertainties of

numerous kinds, and sequencing rules (e.g., Tommelein 1997) and then produce

output data regarding buffer sizes, cycle times, idle times, production rates, etc.

The symbols commonly used to depict process models for construction, however,

have yet to distinguish how processes are being managed, for instance, whether or

not a JIT system has been implemented. Practitioners in manufacturing, working for

Toyota and then later for other companies ‘going lean’ developed their own pictorial

language to help focus attention on what matters in their transition.

We borrowed such symbols from Rother and Shook (1998) and used them to

map structural steel supply chains. Boxes denote value-adding processes or

tasks, such as ordering raw materials, fabricating steel, and transporting shipments

to a site. A triangle denotes work in progress or inventory. It represents an

accumulation of product (materials or information) possibly of unlimited amount

and for an indeterminate duration. An inverted triangle is an order to batch.

Kanban (introduced in Figure 1) denote orders to withdraw

or produce product, in order to deplete or replenish a supermarket. A

supermarket, represented by , refers to controlled inventory in terms of how

much material is kept on hand and how replenishment takes place. The FIFO

symbol denotes the first-in-first out release of resources output by a task.

The circular arrow denotes a physical pull of materials from a supermarket. It

differs from the withdrawal kanban in that it pertains to the amount of product

needed at the time of the withdrawal and not necessarily a predetermined


fixed quantity. A dashed line with an arrow designates the flow of product. A

solid white line is transportation of product to the customer site. A black-and-

white dotted line shows that product is pushed into inventory.

Rother and Shook (1998) use these symbols for so-called “value stream

mapping” where the term “value” pertains mainly to reducing work in process

inventories and product cycle times. Our use of this notation stems as much from

our desire to engage in mapping the structural steel supply chain as it does from

our desire to test the adequacy of those symbols in representing

architecture/engineering/construction processes and in capturing value.

4.3 Example Structural Steel Supply Chain for Building Construction

The structural steel supply chain for building construction differs in several

regards from the one for industrial construction. The building’s frame may in fact be

more complex, especially when it supports a very tall structure, so the major steel

sections require extra procurement effort.

The industry is also organized differently. On design-bid-build projects, a

common delivery method for buildings, the owner typically hires an architectural

engineering (AE) firm, which in turn hires a structural designer. When the AE has

prepared all bid documents, the project is put out for bid. A general contractor (GC)

is then selected. The GC subcontracts the steel work to the fabricator, who in turn

subcontracts field installation work to a structural steel erector. The latter

essentially provides the crane and skilled labor, whereas the former is responsible

for acquiring, fabricating, and shipping the materials to site in the sequence needed

for erection. The fabricator may also subcontract the structural steel detailing work.

Fabricator and erector work as a tightly knit team. The GC will meet with

them during bid preparation. They must assess the project site constraints to

position the erector’s crane, as it determines not only the steel erection sequence

but also the layout of other temporary facilities and thus the flow of many

construction resources. This sequencing in turn drives the fabrication schedule.


It must of course meet the GC’s master schedule but must also be efficient4.

The fabricator who subcontracts the erection work has an incentive to minimize that

work and does so by thoroughly planning the sequencing and site delivery of steel

pieces in the order they will be needed.

As for logistics, a big difference between the industrial and the building

sector is that more often than not building space is very tight, especially on projects

located in an urban environment. Industrial projects tend to be more remotely

sited. Materials deliveries to building projects accordingly are constrained by traffic

patterns and transportation permit requirements. Trucks parked in the street along

the edge of a site ready to off-load steel may not remain there for any extended

time. When deliveries take place, the crane gets dedicated to off-loading and

moving pieces to a staging area, namely the highest floor with decking, from where

steel will subsequently be picked up and moved into final position. Only in

exceptional cases will steel be erected directly off the flatbed truck. This saves extra

handling steps but can be done only when it is acceptable to tie up the truck longer

and provided the steel has been loaded in inverse order needed.

Differences in value stream maps between industrial and building

construction are therefore expected at least near the end of the chain, especially in

the way delivery to the project site is organized. If JIT is practiced in industry today

one possible way is depicted in figure 3.

Figure 3 includes two supermarkets, which illustrate the presence of pull

mechanisms. The steel mill (IV) still takes special orders. The resulting output is

stored in a generic buffer (triangle). The buffer is not specifically controlled in size

but it is filled only based on firm customer orders. That product is sold so it is

unlikely to become obsolete (waste). The mill also produces run-of-the-mill product

in anticipation of customer orders. As was the case in figure 2, this is denoted by a

supermarket where quantity-on-hand will not exceed a threshold value and gets

replenished at appropriate times.


A second supermarket is shown in figure 3 to handle output from fabrication

(III). For instance, the fabricator of a 20-story building could complete the steel for

stories 1 through 3, then await orders from the construction site (withdrawal

kanban) to ship them steel for story 1 before starting work on story 4 (production

kanban). A smaller inventory buffer may be well suited provided fabrication can

keep pace with erection. Since there is virtually no storage space on site, no buffer

of materials is shown preceding ERECT[ion] (VI).

The creation of large buffers either at the contractor’s or fabricator’s site is

contrary to JIT production system design. As the word JIT suggests, materials must

be fabricated or delivered on time, which means not too late but not too early

either. This implies that variability regarding timing, actual pieces released, as well

as quality must be limited and controlled.

In a true JIT system, this timeliness pertains not only to a single hand-off

between two production steps, but rather, one aims at achieving JIT flow between

all production steps. In the idealistic extreme, this means having no buffers at all!

In practice, this means buffers must be determined strategically. Admittedly, doing

so is not an easy task, especially in a production system of complex products that

involve several organizations as is the case for structural steel. But this is what lean


production systems design is all about: achieving flow where possible and

thoughtfully locating buffers and sizing them to achieve cost-effective

decoupling with minimal impact on cycle time.

A significantly amount of additional data is needed to describe the structural

steel supply chain at a level of detail that makes it possible to strategically locate

and size buffers. The difficulty is doing so stems in part from the fact that structural

steel is custom designed and every project requires a variety of components that

change as construction progresses.

Because of construction’s one-of-a-kind project nature, the structural steel

supply chain differs from manufacturing systems for more standardized products,

which can be likened to the Toyota Production System. The manufacturing symbols

used here for mapping the steel supply chain provide no room for defining

individually-characterized resources or detailed sequencing rules. While their ability

to show processing durations and delay times has not been used in this paper (we

expect to do so in future work), we doubt that using only deterministic values will

suffice. Some representation of uncertainty will have to be incorporated in the

maps.

The current practice of buffering stems from the desire to optimize labor and

machine utilization and from admitting that uncertainties exist in the supply chain.

Many uncertainties are the result of variability, which could be understood better if

at least it were measured and explicitly accounted for. This is not the current

practice in construction. Uncertainties and variability should not be taken for

granted. They should be acknowledged, managed, and minimized to a reasonable

degree. In fact, one technique to identify them is to reduce buffer sizes in-between

various production steps in order to see and learn the extent to which they are

needed. Process improvement efforts can then focus on those steps where the

impact on throughput of the system as a whole will be most significant. Example

improvements in construction are those that aim at reducing uncertainty, as is done


for instance through reliable planning by the Last Planner (Ballard and Howell

1998), work methods design, and work structuring (Ballard et al. 1999).


CHAPTER 5

JIT : CASE STUDIES

5.0 CASE STUDY JUST IN TIME

A case study pertains contractors who bids on projects from County of San

Francisco, the Public Utilities Commission as well as the Water Department. Most of

these jobs include concrete of a well-defining and widely-used kind through

quantities usually small in comparison to what is needed for residential or office

building projects.

Concrete is a very common construction material. Projects ranging from a single

family home to a high-rise building all may need concrete for their foundation,

slabs, columns, beams, walls, etc. to be constructed.

In urban settings, the task of delivering concrete moreoften than not has

been delegated to ready-mix batch plants and contractors has to rely on the timing

and reliability of their service. Although this set-up puts the contractor’s project

somewhat at the mercy of the batch plant, most batch plants perform at their very

best to meet their customers’ schedules.

On-time delivery is part of the product they sell. The interplay between

contractors and batch plants is interesting. On one hand, the contractor must order

a large enough quantity, sufficiently long ahead of time to ensure available batch

plant capacity and timely delivery service in order to maximize productivity of their

placing crew.

On the other hand, the batch plant tries to time its deliveries so that all projects

are served according to the contractors’ needs and the plant as well as the trucks

and drivers have little idle time. This balancing act between the two parties is not

always achieved due to the nature of concrete and the nature of the production

systems being used.


In addition to contractors and batch plants, this balancing act also involves the

suppliers of raw materials to the batch plant, crews on site that erect formwork and

tie reinforcing basin preparation for concrete placement, as well as others.

Although the interdependence of all these parties typically results in uncertainties

rippling through the supply chain, the focus of this paper is limited to the

downstream-, namely the contractor vs. batch plant relationship.

The batch plant could, in order to level its load, vary its unit price of ready-mix

concrete based on the time and day of the week at which concrete is to be

delivered. This would illustrate a market mechanism at work, however, we are not

aware of such differential pricing being advertised in the industry today.

As one can imagine the city imposes limits on working hours in order to avoid

congestion during peak traffic times, excessively long closure of a road for vehicular

or of a sidewalk for pedestrian traffic, undue inconvenience of road users and

complaints about noise from citizens or area residents. In addition, contractors

must obtain a work permit from the city in order to work at a specific location.

This contractor s main concern has been tardiness of deliveries made by

batch plants. Because most of these jobs have restricted working hours, punctual

delivery is of paramount importance.

However because each order is small ( a few cubic yard at a time),this

contractor cannot get any plants attention. Went plant truck arrive late to his jobs,

he loses that time for the concrete to set and may therefore not be able to open the

site to traffic when needed.

To achieve on-time performance this contractor has acquired a fleet of small

revolving-drum trucks as well as dump trucks (used to fill ‘potholes with concrete)

to meet his projects concrete transportation needs, The latter trucks are not so

good as the former for transporting concrete as the mix may segregate.


This contractor has its trucks pull into any batch- plant during operating

hours and order concrete. The contractor-owned trucks simply join the line of plant

trucks waiting to be loaded. The driver then goes to the operator’s walk-up window

and orders the needed mix design and quantity. The batch plant fills these trucks in

the same way as it fills its own in a first-in-first-out manner. The contractor then

gets billed on a regular basis for exact amount loaded. At the site, the driver works

with the crew in placing concrete.

Providing one’s own ready-mix trucks does not mean that the unit price of

concrete is any cheaper but it overcomes many scheduling hassles. No advance

order needs to be placed to reserve plant capacity as only a few cubic yards of

commodity mix are needed each time.

By taking control over the transportations process and the contractors crew

can work at their own pace and not have to fret over when concrete would arrive.

This kanban system work well especially on these projects where timing of need is

not dictated exclusively be the contractor, but as is the case here also to a

significant extent by the owner.

This contractors has its trucks pull into any batch-plant during operating

hours and order concrete. The contractor-owned truck simply join the line of plant

trucks waiting to be loaded. The driver then goes to the operators walk-up window

and orders the needed mix design and quantity.

The batch plant fills these trucks in the same way as it fills its own, in a first-

in-first –out manner. The contractor then gets billed on a regular basis for exact

amount loaded. At the site the driver works with the crew in placing concrete.

Providing ones own ready mix trucks does not mean that the unit price of

concrete is any cheaper but it overcomes many scheduling hassle. No advance

order needs to be placed to reserve plant capacity as only a few cubic yards of

commodity mix are needed each time.


By taking control over the transportation process and using trucks as kanban

each time concrete is needed, the contractor’s crew can work at their own pace and

not have to fret over when concrete would arrive. This kanban system works well

especially on these projects where timing of need is not dictated exclusively by the

contractor, but as is the case here, also to a significant extent by the owner.

This contractor thus controls what is otherwise a system variable controlled

by an upstream supplier, namely the batch plant’s delivery of concrete. As a result,

the contractor can better schedule his work and be more reliable in making project

due dates.

Should one batch plant not be able to serve his needs, he can easily go

elsewhere. The contractors pays for this ability. He now needs to have capital tied

up in trucks and is responsible for hiring and training drivers. Because he has a

fairly steady need for concrete from one project to the next(contrary to many

other who need concrete only for one phase of their work.)he can keep them

gainfully employed.

Ready-mix concrete is a prototypical of a JIT production system in

construction. Two practices regarding ready-mix batching and delivery were

described in this paper and depicted using value stream mapping symbols.

Each case highlighted the presence of buffers of information, materials, and

time as well as production order and withdrawal mechanisms positioned at strategic

locations to meet specific system requirements, as defined by the nature of the

contractor’s work.

One alternative is favored over the other depending on the amount of control

the contractor wants in terms of on-time delivery of concrete and the variability in

the contractor’s demand for concrete project after project.

While these practices clearly exemplify JIT production, the paper was limited

in scope. No data was included to characterize the actual performance in terms of

timeliness, buffer sizes, error rates, etc. Moreover, the paper focused on batching

and delivery, which are only parts of the entire concrete production system.


Current practices for managing the concrete supply chain upstream in terms

of raw materials acquisition or prerequisite work on site are not geared toward JIT

production. Further investigation is therefore warranted and significant process

improvements may be achieved by those working towards fully implementing a lean

construction system.

Case Study 2 : Fakuda Production System (FPS)

The construction companies that adopted the Toyota Production

System and Just in Time on a large scale in Japan are Fakuda Corporation in the

field of building construction and couple of companies in the field of housing

construction.

Fakuda Corp. is a Niigita-based construction company having annual sales of

$ 946 million(in 2003).With the objective of making construction work more

efficient and reducing construction costs, the company introduced the system in

construction work in 2002.

In order to introduce the system the company received guidance from

consultants CULMAN CO.LTD who were former employees of Toyota Motor Corp.

This building production system is called the Fakuda Production System( FPS)


Setting the goal

Establishment of indices to attain goal.

Establishment JIT.

Establishment of standard operating procedure

documents (SOPD) for each work type.

Setting of target figures for the indices

Implementation

Check and confirm that target

figures have been attained


The material distribution facilities were established so that materials can be

delivered to the site JIT. In addition, the JIT material distribution network was set

up to link the field office,branch offices, and material distribution facilities,

Necessary materials are delivered to the predetermined location( Room C on Floor

B at Site A,for example)in time. To visualize the JIT delivery process, the JIT

delivery system board is posted to boost awareness. Time is Money among

workers.

The JIT ideal is elimination of physical buffers (materials or time)between

production processes, and the achievement of one piece flow within processes, i.e.

batch sizes of one.JIT was able to virtually eliminate such in-process inventories

because production scheduling provided sufficiently stable coordination of flows.

Construction scheduling does not provide such stabilization.

Consequently, it is not appropriate to simply eliminate physical buffers

without first attacking the causes of variation and uncertainty. Even though

manufacturing and construction share the same ultimate objective of reducing

variation and waste, their strategies for achieving that objective must be different.

Materials constitute a huge proportion of the cost of construction. Materials

are sometimes ordered weeks or even months ahead of requirement leading to

uneconomical inventory on construction sites or contractors' warehouses.

Building material inventory represents cost to procure, cost to store and

insure, cost to guard against theft and cost incurred when inventory becomes

obsolete. This paper presents an overview of the Just-in-Time (JIT) production

system and discusses application and implementation issues for the control of

material inventory in building construction.

JIT ensures that suppliers deliver directly to the production floor to achieve

either a reduction in inventory or zero inventory and consequently a reduction in

production costs. Implementation of JIT building material management in

construction has the potential to realize the same far reaching benefits experienced

in manufacturing.


Relevant factors to consider in JIT implementation for material inventory

management in construction are implications for construction output and quantities,

production planning, design planning, construction contractor and suppliers'

relationships, material sourcing, and education and training.

Case Study 3 : The Byggelogistik project

Up till now Byggelogistik has been tested on six housing schemes, the first

being Sophiehaven approximately 20 miles north of Copenhagen. The project is a

typical Danish social housing project comprising 100 flats in two stories blocks,

erected in two phases - not a big project on an international scale (Bertelsen 1993,

1994-1, 1994-2). Contractually the project was undertaken by a general contractor

and approximately 10 trade contractors. The general contractor's staff participated

in the whole planning of the project.

It was also from the staff of the general contactor that the provider was

recruited and his job developed, as the project progressed, into being the

production manager of the construction site.

He planned the day-to-day operations, he provided the materials required,

he coordinated the individual trade contractors' works and he followed up on the

co-operation with the wholesale dealers. In order not to overreach the experiment

in the first phase it was decided to restrict the logistics to a minor number of the

trades. This decision caused a great deal of trouble.

Those not participating were repeatedly in the way of those who were. In

the second phase all trades participated and this problem was solved. Even though

the methods were developed with EDP in mind the first tests were restricted to

management by paper and pencil only. EDP was used in the usual manner in the

participants' own operations but no attempt was made to use IT in the logistics.


Inspired by the Toyota Production System the aim of Byggelogistik is to

reduce cost by eliminating waste of all kinds. Foremost waste of materials, but also

waste of labour time and transportation. In this the Byggelogistik concept is an

instrument for making the whole building process more effective.

The main objective is to look not only at direct transportation costs but at all

costs in the building procesrelated to materials delivery. Materials are not

considered delivered until the workers lay their hands on them in the exact quantity

as the first step in the construction.

Packing, temporary storage, on site transportation, on site losses and

breakage, and low effectiveness due to badly and impedingly delivered and stored

materials are all considered as belonging to the transportation costs.

A Swedish study (Hammarlund 1989) has shown that approximately a third

of the time used by the worker on the building site is spent procuring his materials

in the widest sense, equalling about 10 percent of the total building cost. The

hypothesis of Byggelogistik is that a near-optimum form of supply will increase

costs only marginally, but will reduce waste of time considerably. This means that

materials delivery in Byggelogistik is looked upon from the point of view of an

optimum building process primarily.

Byggelogistik (Bertelsen 1994-1) makes use of a two level logistics with a

planning approach for the over all logistics and a JIT consumption approach for the

daily deliveries. The logistics are considered already on the drawing board.

Materials are, where it is possible, specified as belonging to the separate building

operation during the detailed design.

In the planning of the operations all supplies are described in detail aiming at

JIT supply once a day, comprising only materials needed until the next day, and

packed for the various trades and heir individual tasks and work areas. Such

assemblies of materials are named 'units'. Each type of unit is carefully specified to

include all materials needed for the particular task, and form of packing as well as

equipment for the delivery is detailed. Each type of unit is given a specific number

for identification.


Several participants in the project consider the unit the most original element

in the whole concept. The idea is taken from the Swedish furniture chain Ikea who

sells furniture in parts to be assembled by the customer but with all the parts - and

often tools and assembly instructions in the same box. In order to manage

sorting, packing and delivery a close co-operation with the wholesale dealers must

be established. In Denmark 3 kinds of dealers cover all necessary materials, and

their warehouses are used as store room for the building site.

A few kinds of materials are Delivered directly in units packed by the

manufacturer, but most materials are delivered to the warehouse to be sorted and

packed in units, ready for transportation as the work progresses. In order to reduce

the costs of external transportation joint deliveries are used containing all units

from the dealer regardless of contractor, and to minimize internal transportation

delivery of units takes place as close to the work area as possible.

The dealers' drivers are considered as part of the building team in as much

as the aim is to employ the same drivers to load the trucks and deliver the

materials every day thereby making them familiar with the ever changing lay out of

the building site and choose the best sequence for the unloading.

Byggelogistik is characterized by careful planning, daily management

executed from the building site - not the head office - and immediate and direct

feed back of all mistakes. Careful planning demands that detailed design is fully

completed before the building process is started, in order that all materials may be

counted and specified in units. In this way delivery schedules on a weekly basis

may be worked out right from the start, covering the entire building period, and all

materials may be ordered bindingly.

Planning must take place in close co-operation between designers and trade

contractors, and the wholesale dealer's employees should take part in this. Tests

have shown that this kind of co-operation has resulted in a good deal of

suggestions for more appropriate solutions and choice of materials. At the same

time better terms for delivery are obtained since favorable prices may be offered by

the producers due to early notice.


Construction JIT will be advanced by implementing demonstrated techniques

and industry research to test theoriesand develop new tools and techniques.

Research topics have beenproposed that constitute a strategy for implementing


CHAPTER 6

JIT: CASE STUDY IN MALAYSIA (PUTRAJAYA)

6.1 AN OVERVIEW ON THE CASE STUDY PROJECT

Presint 9 is the selected project to be used as our case study in this task. The selection was

made because Presint 9 is one of the examples of constructions using the IBS technique.

Located in our Government administration areas, this Presint 9 is one of the projects in the

development of Putrajaya areas. Presint 9 is the residential area construct by Setia Putrajaya

Sdn. Bhd. The company had managed to complete the construction of Presint 9 in a minimum

time by using the IBS method of construction.

Based on the observation carried out by Putrajaya Holdings, noticed that the contractor

only need four (4) month to complete the full structure of the apartment until level six (6)

comparing to the used of conventional method that can only construct full structure of the

building until level four (4) in the same period. Based on this statement prove that by using the

IBS system to the construction of the building may reduced the time for the completion. It also

be noted that this IBS system not only give the advantages in term of time to this construction

but also give benefit in term of cost for the development. The contractor managed to reduced

cost on labor because this method will reduced the used of labor in the construction. Moreover,

there will be a reduction in the cost of project, this is because this method will reduced the waste

in the construction that will contribute to the minimizing the cost of project. These prove that the

application of IBS method is one of the techniques that can achieve the implementation of JIT

approach.

FIGURE 2: PICTURES OF THE PRESINT 9 PROJECT USING IBS


6.2 Problem in the implementation JIT Approach into the Construction Industries

JIT gives a lot of benefits to our construction industries, but there are several problems that may

contribute to the failure on its implementation. The problems that occur may contribute to the

inefficiency and ineffectiveness for JIT approach been implemented. The problems may occur

based on the unique characteristic of the construction industries itself. Below are several

problems that been identified faced in the implementation of JIT approach in the construction

industries.

6.2.1 Material Shortage

Material is one of the crucial items in the process of production in the construction industries.

Shortage in the material supply is one of the problems in our industries. Therefore, the material

cannot be distributes to the site on time and this situation may affect the time factor for the

project progress.

6.2.2 Weather

The production place for the construction is unique and not similar to other manufacturing

production. Generally, construction activities located in the open space known as site comparing

with manufacturing production that were conducted in the building. Weather is one of the factors

that may contribute to the interruption in the construction activities. The uncertainty of weather

may contribute to the problems in the JIT implementation.

6.2.3 Design Changes

To fulfill the client satisfaction, most of the procurement methods in our industries give a space

for the client to makes changes in the design during the construction progress. This factor may

effect the time and the cost for the project. We cannot achieve the completion dates because

the changes may influence to extend and add the time of completion for the project. Therefore,

JIT approaches are not applicable to this kind of construction.

6.2.4 Cost

IBS system been said as the effective construction technique in the implementation the JIT

approach. IBS system may cut the time factor for the construction industries and reduce the

numbers of delays on the project. The problem is the cost to be used in this system is higher

compared to the conventional techniques used in this construction industry.


Analysis between JIT and IBS

6.3 ANALYSIS FRAMEWORK

FIGURE 3: Analysis I - JIT Principles to Project Th at Using IBS

•Right Materials

•Right Quantities

•Right Quality

JIT

•Quality of work

•Speed up of construction process

•Increase production

•Cost Saving

•Applicable to all type of buildings

IBS

Manufacture

•Improve quality

•Reduce wastage

•Less labour

•Faster

•Economies (large scale production)

Fabrication

originate from originate from

•Pull System

•Top Management Commitment & Employee Involvement

•Elimination of Waste

•Total Quality Control (TQC)

•Uninterrupted Work Flow

•Supplier Relation = One Source

JIT Key Principles

Contractor or Project that using IBS in Malaysia

Case Study:

Assignment Flow

Theory Framework

Assignment Framework

Step 1: To achieve JIT

philosophy required to fulfil JIT 6 key

principles

Step 2: Analyze the case study with the JIT 6 key principles

implementation

Step 3: Analyze that what is

the correlation with the project result and IBS

advantages

3

2

1


6.4 ANALYSIS

Analysis I - JIT Principles to Project That Using I BS No JIT 6 Key Principles Case Study: Putrajaya Holding Sdn Bhd 1 Pull System � Strong joint effort with the Project Supplier (Setia

Precast Sdn. Bhd), allows the technical department and the contractor to have a better managed on ‘pull’ demands system from the workstation without overproducing unrelated prefabrication components. This effort had help in expedite the construction of various types of multilevel apartments of Presint 9.

2 Top Management Commitment & Employee Involvement

� The determination of the top management of Putrajaya Holdings in handling IBS project in a mechanical intensive way, suits with their corporate vision that leads them to be the greatest Property Developer in the country.

3 Elimination of Waste � IBS method emphasized on the usage of the natural environmental techniques and reduction of construction waste material. Conventional techniques that involve unskilled labour; such as laying up bricks, brickwork, plastering and concrete work done off-site, will only caused accidents to occur, due to untidy and messy site especially for big project in Putrajaya.

� The application of IBS system in Putrajaya had also proved the high commitments of Putrajaya Holdings in undertaking the Malaysian government’s challenge that encourage the increment of construction productivity from the benefits of less wastage, low risk and damage and higher innovation.

� IBS system in Presint 9 has not just increased the work productivity but it also reduces the local currency exchange by the foreign workers to their origin country. IBS also reduce the foreign labour


supply into Malaysia, as reported by Setia Putrajaya, the application of IBS System had reduce to 30% of excessive reliance on unskilled foreign workers for the project.

4 Total Quality Control (TQC) � IBS System maintain the quality and high

aesthetic end products for the whole building structure and envelope as it ensure a proper arrangement of prefabricated beam and column that fits to the building. This method will gives a fine look of the building without any design or material discrepancies that will spoil the architectural style of the building.

5 Uninterrupted Workflow � With IBS approach, construction units of apartments could be done with a systematic approach as compared to the conventional methods. According to Setia Putrajaya, the contractor only took four (4) months in order to complete one six storey apartment type Parsel 8 in Presint 9. Where else, within the same time line, the building could only be completed up to level four (4) if the conventional method is used.

6 Supplier Relation = One Source

� The successful application of IBS System must be accredited to the effort of Setia Precast Sdn Bhd; one of the local IBS experts. The IBS specialist conceived, planned, fabricated the components at their factory before it were transported and erected on site. This process allows Setia Precast to ensure that the right components are produced at the right time, in the right order and without defect. The systematic approach will not only sustain the quality of the project but it also ensures that the project is completed on the right time.


Analysis II – IBS Advantages with JIT project case NO IBS Advantages Correlation with the result of JIT Analysis 1 Quality of work � From applying Total Quality Control (TQC)

principle, we can see that Putrajaya Holding Sdn Bhd can maintain the quality and high aesthetic end products. They admitted that the quality of work is satisfying from the fine look of the building. So having TQC in implementation IBS system gives maximal advantages in the term quality of work.

� From applying supplier relation with only one (1) source of supplier, Putrajaya Holding Sdn Bhd also get the benefit because this method allows the supplier, Setia Precast to ensure that the right components are produced at the right time, in the right order and without defect.

2 Speed up of construction process

� From applying uninterrupted workflow principles, Putrajaya Holding Sdn Bhd gets the advantages of a fast construction period comparing the conventional method. With the project in Presint 9, the have proven that it only take four (4) month for six (6) storey building. If the workflow was interrupted, then there will be a big chance that the advantages of IBS regarding speed up of construction process can not achieved.

� From applying supplier relation with only one (1) source of supplier, Putrajaya Holding Sdn Bhd admitted that the systematic approach will not only sustain the quality of the project but it also ensures that the project is completed on the right time.

3 Increase production � From applying top Management Commitment and Employee Involvement principle, one of the benefit of Putrajaya Holding Sdn Bhd that this lead to their corporate vision as the greatest Property Developer in the country where this will


influence their productivity. � From applying elimination of waste principles,

Putrajaya Holding Sdn Bhd proved that encourage the increment of construction productivity from the benefits of less wastage, low risk and damage and higher innovation.

� From applying elimination of waste principles, Putrajaya Holding Sdn Bhd also manage to increase the work productivity and also reduces the local currency exchange by the foreign workers to their origin country.

4 Cost Saving � From applying supplier relation with only one (1)

source of supplier, Putrajaya Holding Sdn Bhd admitted that it really influences the efficiency of project. In a construction project, good efficiency means good cost saving.

5 Applicable to all type of buildings

� From applying pull system in their IBS project, Putrajaya Holding Sdn Bhd admitted that it helps in expedite the construction of various types of multilevel apartments of Presint 9. Even though this still in one (1) project case but even in one (1) project required a variety of apartments type. From this project, it is optimistic that it can be applicable in other kind of buildings.


6.5 CONCLUSION

After doing two times analysis (see analysis I and II) we can see for this particular project how

the correlation between adopting JIT principles and advantages in IBS system. Putrajaya

Holding Sdn Bhd doing IBS system in their project in Presint 9. We can see that in their process

of implementation IBS project they fulfill six (6) JIT key principles in the first analysis. Then we

try to relate with the main advantages of IBS in second analysis. We can see that Putrajaya

Holding Sdn Bhd also can obtain all the main advantages of IBS. From this case study

analysis, as a conclusion we can say that if a contractor doing an IBS project and applying JIT

six (6) key principles completely, there is a big opportunity that the contractor can obtain the

maximal of IBS system. From the theory framework (see figure 2), it could be explained that this

parallel correlation between JIT and IBS because both of it comes from the manufacture

philosophy. And with this case study, we can recommend that if you want to gain maximal

advantages of IBS system, by applying JIT in the process can give you a big guaranty of the

successful of the project. This recommendation can be use if Malaysian promoting IBS system

in their construction industry in the future.


CHAPTER 7

JIT : CONCLUSION

Successful implementation of JIT would be able to reduce several elements

such as inventory level, storage space, factory overhead, production costs,

rectification works which will lead to improvement in quality. However, Low Sui

Pheng (1999) concluded that the mentioned fundamentals of JIT can only be

achieved with the cooperation from all parties as a working team. Therefore, it's

very important for everyone involved in construction project to understand the

objective, the fundamental of Just In Time method and his or her roles in order to

ensure a successful implementation of JIT system.

Construction and manufacturing are different types of production,

nonetheless a form of JIT is applicable to construction, in which physical buffers

may ultimately be replaced by better managing uncertainty and eliminating

thecauses of flow variation. As the implementation of plan buffers propagates

certainty throughout projects, productivity will improve from better matching labor

to work flow, and project durations will shorten as physical buffers shrink with the

flow variation they are designed to absorb.

A new way of conceiving the tasks and tools of construction project

management has been proposed. Instead of relying simply on schedule-push,

managers are advised to systematically employ plan-pull as a means of adjusting to

uncertainty and insuring that resources are employed to maximum advantage

attach point in time. Instead of concentrating management attention and effort on

managing contracts and enforcing obligations, managers are advised to manage the

flow of work across production processes and the various specialty organizations

brought into a project to execute those processes.


Low and Mok (1999) suggested a more practical application of JIT principles

for site layout in reducing and minimizing the occurrence of waste, and concluded

that the Kanban system can be modified for use in ordering and delivering

materials to site. People-related problems were, however, singled out as the main

difficulties in the implementation of the JIT philosophy (Low and Mok, 1999).


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