7AR163

FACILITY PLANNING AND SPECALISED

LEC NO 09: Facility Layout

BY: ASST. PROF. AMIT KUMAR BALA

Facility location may be defined as a place where Facility layout may be defined as the arrangement of
the facility will be set up for producing goods or machinery, equipment, and other amenities in a
services. The need for location selection may arise facility, which should ensure a smooth movement of
materials.
under any of the following conditions:
According to Moore, facility layout is the plan of or
• When a business is newly started. the act of planning an optimum arrangement of
• When the existing business unit has facilities, including personnel, operating equipment,
outgrown its original facilities and storage space, material handling equipment, and all
expansion is not possible; hence a new other supporting services along with the design of the
location has to be found. best structure to contain these facilities.
• When the volume of business or the extent
of market necessitates establishment of
branches.
• When the lease expires and the landlord
does not renew the lease.
• Other social or economic reasons.
Advantages of Product Layout –

● As this type of layout prefers mechanical feeding into devices, it brings down cost of production
● Takes less time for production
● Considered as highly economical among layouts
● Better Production controls
● Small floor space for single machine
● Reduction in WIP ( work in progress) areas
● Does not require a Skillful human resources at site operations ● Better coordination
● Production process is simple in nature
● Workers movement completely low
Disadvantages of Product layout –
● Lack of Flexibility in production operations
● Supervisory on operations are bit low
● Less Scope for expansion of this layout
● As the production is done in sequence manner, any break down of
one equipment in the process, the production will be down or stopped
until it is repaired or replaced
● Investment in this type is expensive, as production units need to keep
a spare or extra equipment at handy to replace any equipment in case
of failure while in production process
Objectives of an Effective Facility Layout
Factors Affecting a Facility Layout
Prerequisites for Developing a Facility Layout

• Developing process charts: A process chart is the graphical representation of production activities performed by
an organisation. Process charts facilitate a systematic analysis and demonstration of the entire production
process. These charts are further classified into two categories, namely operation process chart and flow process
chart.

• Making process flow diagrams: A process flow diagram represents the movement of materials on a floor layout.
These diagrams help an organisation in avoiding needless material movement and rearranging facility operations.

• Developing machine data cards: A machine data card helps in developing equipment layout (pieces of equipment
layout in relation to everything including the persons using them) by providing information related to power and
materials handling requirements and capacity and dimensions of different machines.

• Visualizing the layout: It represents the most common technique that is deployed for layout planning. It involves
creating duplication of machines and equipment and arranging them in two- or three-dimensional plans for
determining the effectiveness of a layout.
Process of Facility Layout Designing
Types of Facility Layouts
Techniques for Designing a Facility Layout
Two main techniques of designing a facility layout are:
Techniques for Designing a Facility Layout

• Block diagramming: The block diagram can be prepared by following the steps given
below:

1. Analyze the unit load summary that provides information about the average number of unit loads
moved between different departments of an organisation.

2. Calculate the composite movements (back-and-forth movement) of the unit load between the
departments and rank them from the highest movement to the lowest movement.

3. Place the trial layouts, which are designed using the ranking between departments, on a grid. This
grid represents the relative distance between the departments.
Techniques for Designing a Facility Layout

• Richard Muther’s systematic layout planning (SLP): In this technique, a

• This grid is also called ‘closeness rating chart’. In this chart, the rating for
department A relative to department B is similar to the rating of
department B to department A. Closeness ratings are given to
departments in the form of codes, which depict the desired closeness of
the departments according to the relative strength of their closeness.
New Approaches to Layout Design
Revision of a Current Layout

The following developments necessitate the revision of the existing layout:

• Product layout: In product layout, also called straight line layout, machinery is arranged in one line as per the
sequence of production operations. Materials are fed into the first machine and finished products come out of the
last machine.

• Fixed position layout: This type of facility layout is used to assemble products that are too large, heavy or fragile to
move to a location for completion. In the fixed position layout, machinery, men, as well as other pieces of material,
are brought to the location where the product is to be assembled.

• Cellular manufacturing layout: In Cellular Manufacturing (CM) layout, machines are grouped into cells, which
function somewhat like a product layout in a larger shop or a process layout. Each cell in the CM layout is formed to
produce a single part family, that is, a few parts with common characteristics.

• Combination or hybrid layout: It is difficult to use the principles of product layout, process layout, or fixed location
layout in facilities that involve fabrication of parts and assembly. Fabrication tends to employ the process layout,
while assembly areas often employ the product layout.
Service Facility Layouts
The objectives of service facility layouts differ from those of manufacturing facility layouts.

This is because a manufacturing facility aims to make on-time delivery of products to customers, whereas
customers come to a service facility to receive services.

Therefore, customers usually prefer a service facility that is close to them, especially when the service delivery
process requires considerable customer contact.

For example, if you are hungry, you would prefer to go to a restaurant near you.
Service Facility Layouts
Service facility layouts are often categorized under three heads, which are:

➢ Product layout: This type of layout is used only in cases where services are organized in a sequence.

➢ Process layout: These layouts are highly common in service facilities as they successfully deal with
the varied customer processing requirements.

➢ Fixed position layout: In this type of service layout, materials, labour and equipment are brought to
the customer’s place. This layout is used in services like appliance repair, landscaping, home
remodeling, etc
Types of Service Facility Layouts
1. Warehouse and storage layouts: The layouts of warehouse and storage facilities are designed by
considering the frequency of order. Items that are ordered frequently are placed near the facility entrance.
However, items that are not ordered frequently are placed at the rear of the facility. Apart from this,
correlation between two merchandises is also important while designing a layout for a warehouse and
storage facility

2. Retail layouts: A retail store layout refers to a systematic arrangement of merchandise groups within a store.
A well-planned retail store layout provides a description of the size and location of each department of the store,
fixture locations, and traffic patterns. It also helps consumers find products of their choice in a short time.

Different retail layouts are: ➢ Grid layout ➢ Free-form layout ➢ Loop layout ➢ Spine layout

3. Office layouts: Designing of office layouts is witnessing revolutionary changes as paperwork is now replaced with
different modes of electronic communications. Today, office layouts focus more on creating an image of openness.
Low-rise partitions are preferred between departments to facilitate easy communication among workers.
 Let’s Sum Up
• A facility location may be defined as the place where a facility will be set up for producing goods or services.

• Selection of a suitable facility location is important as it decides the fate of a business. A good location may
reduce the cost of production and distribution to a considerable extent.

• Once established, a location cannot be changed frequently as it incurs huge costs.

• A facility layout is defined as the arrangement of machinery, equipment and other amenities in a facility to
ensure the smooth movement of materials.

• The objectives of service facility layouts differ from those of manufacturing facility layouts. This is because a
service operation aims to organize all activities and processes to deliver services to customers.
Thank
You..