Kanban maintenance

What is the kanban Maintenance?

Over time, the consumption of materials managed through a kanban system can vary: as a result, it might become necessary to review or update the sizing of a kanban loop by adding or removing cards.

The Maintenance module in KanbanBOX can help you monitor how each kanban loop reacts over time, by tracking their consumption profiles and by also giving you a one-glimpse overview on the currently active kanban loops. By constantly keeping track of the consumptions for each kanban loop, the Maintenance module can compute the exact number of cards needed and suggest a possible resizing to align the loop with the real consumption data.

Consumption maintenance

The Consumption maintenance suggests a scaling up or down of a kanban loop based on the actual consumption profile recorded by KanbanBOX in the last period, normally the last 5 Lead Times.

Procedure:

1. Go to Kanbans > Kanban maintenance > Maintenance from consumptions;
2. In the table Kanban loops maintenance from KanbanBOX statistics check the Maintenance alert and check the Adjustment needed and the Suggested adjustment;
3. Resize the loop from the Operations column.

How to read the table fields useful for resizing

The table contains a series of fields that refer to the loop data and specific fields to carry out the loop maintenance.

Field	Description
Average Real Lead Time	Represents the average real Lead Time of the loop. The real Lead Time of a kanban card is calculated as the difference between the Full date and the Release date. The analysis period for the average Lead Time calculation corresponds to the analysis period used to calculate the Maximum consumption per day from KanbanBOX.
Comparison between average real LT and current loop LT	Represents the percentage difference between the Average Real Lead Time and the Lead Time of the kanban loop.
Maximum consumption per day from KanbanBOX	Represents the maximum daily consumption calculated with the moving average on Lead Time. The quantity of consumed material is detected when an available card is declared in the state Released, while the default analysis period is the last 5 Lead Times. The analysis period can be changed from Settings > Company Settings > Kanban consumption calculation.
Adjustment needed	It represents the percentage scaling necessary to have a sizing perfectly aligned with the detected consumptions.
Suggested adjustment	It represents the number of cards that are suggested to be added to or removed from the kanban loop to get closer to the correct sizing (the resizing may slightly differ from the necessary resizing since the increases/decreases are made of discrete units).
Maintenance alert	Visual alert useful to filter the loops for which it's suggested to increase/decrease the number of cards. The icon represents the loops for which a change in the number of cards is suggested. Click on the icon to deactivate it (for example, because you do not want to temporarily downsize the loop). The alert will become active again if occurs a further deviation of +/- 20% of the detected consumption or in any case after 30 days.
Change in stock value	It represents the economic impact on the total of the stock in the warehouse if the resizing suggestion is accepted. To view it, you must have completed the Statistical cost parameter in the advanced fields of the part master data.

Operations

The operations you can perform to resize the loop are the following:

• : to recalculate the consumption data for the kanban loop;
• : each click increases by 1 the number of cards in the loop;
• : each click reduces by 1 the number of cards in the loop;
• : by clicking on this icon, the loop is going to be automatically resized according to KanbanBOX suggestions;
• : link to the statistics page (see the guide Kanban loop statistics);
• : to access the page Edit your kanban loop;
• : to see to the loop in the board as planner.

Maintenance from imported consumptions

To carry out a massive adjustment of the loops due to possible or foreseen changes in the parts' consumption (for example for a product with seasonality), it is possible to import external consumption data inside KanbanBOX.

To do it, it is mandatory to enter the partner identification code in the partner database (field Partner number, see the guide Create and update a partner).

Procedure:

1. Go to Kanbans > Kanban maintenance > Import consumptions;
2. Click on the link kanban_maintenance_import_cons.xls to automatically download the Excel file. Once downloaded, open the file and enter the consumption to be imported. Follow the instructions on how to compile the file shown in the Help sheet (it is not mandatory to keep the name kanban_maintenance_import_cons.xls);
3. Save the file and upload it by clicking on Choose file in the field Excel file for consumption data, then click on Import consumption data;
4. Resize.

Go to Kanban loops maintenance from imported consumption from Kanbans > Kanban maintenance > Maintenance from import.

Field	Description
Maximum consumption per day from KanbanBOX	Represents the maximum daily consumption calculated with the moving average on Lead Time. The quantity of consumed material is detected when an available card is declared as Released, while the default analysis period is the last 5 Lead Times. The analysis period can be changed from Settings > Company Settings > Kanban consumption calculation.
Maximum consumption per day from import	It is the imported data.
Adjustment needed	It represents the percentage scaling necessary to align the sizing to the imported consumption.
Suggested adjustment	It represents the number of cards that should be added to or removed from the kanban loop to get closer to the most correct sizing (the resizing may slightly differ from the necessary resizing since the increases/decreases are made of discrete units).

Operations

The operations you can perform from the maintenance table are:

• : each click increases by 1 the number of cards in the loop;
• : each click reduces by 1 the number of cards in the loop;
• : by clicking on this icon, the loop is going to be automatically resized according to KanbanBOX suggestions;
• : link to the statistics page (see the guide Kanban loop statistics);
• : to access the page Edit your kanban loop;
• : to see the kanban loop in the board as planner.

Resizing actions

The Operations possible are:

• : each click increases by 1 the number of cards within the loop. A kanban card in the state New in created in the board;
• : each click reduces by 1 the number of cards within the loop. The number of cards on the board doesn't decrease immediately, but only after the release of a card in the state Full;
• : by clicking on this icon, the loop is going to be automatically resized according to KanbanBOX suggestions.