accelerating manufacturing & quality engineeringof the features and characteristics that are...

Accelerating Manufacturing & Quality Engineering

7 Key Insights for Bringing Digital Work Instructions to Reality

www.DISCUSsoftware.comCopyright © 2016 DISCUS Software Company. All Rights Reserved

History of Digital Work Instructions

The 7 Key Insights about Digital Work Instructions

The Smart TDP and Digital Thread to make it Happen

The Potential Benefits within Your Grasp

To Learn More about DISCUS and DWI

The ideas shared in the following pages and the associated prescriptive solutions come from our many years of experience working with manufacturing and quality engineers. Pursuing software solutions to these and other challenges is our purpose as an organization. We hope that you gain at least one idea or tip on how to address your challenges. If not, contact us and challenge us directly with your problem.


Copyright © 2016 DISCUS Software Company. All Rights Reserved | www.DISCUSsoftware.com

To provide context for these key insights, it’s essential to take a step back and

consider the historical perspective with manufacturing work instructions.

What we refer to today as Digital Work Instructions (DWI) was originally marketed as

“paperless manufacturing”. The initial forays into digitizing the shop paperwork started more

than 25 years ago with expensive minicomputers, hard-wired terminals on the shop floor, and

wedge bar code readers. The manufacturing control software that was the basis for paperless

manufacturing was fairly limited compared to current capabilities. For example, even with the

advent of the Windows operating system, the integration of text with graphical information was

still very challenging.

As companies started to lower the bar to ensure some moderate level of success, the concept of

paperless manufacturing morphed into the less visionary objective of Electronic Work Instructions

(EWI). The notion of EWI was the recognition that the goal was not necessarily to remove all

paper from the shop, but instead to provide efficient means of handling changes to manufacturing

plans. There was also the acknowledgment that providing work instructions that are easy to

“consume” required a useful tool to help “author” the electronic instructions. This resulted in the

introduction of Computer Aided Process Planning (CAPP). The CAPP tools were initially fairly

limited and focused on enabling the user to associate graphics with text.

Currently, the most common toolset for authoring work instructions in many manufacturing

companies is a text editor inside the ERP system, where the directions are associated with each

operation sequence in the part’s routing. The second most common approach is an adjunct

system composed of the Microsoft Office toolset of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint along with a

CAD viewing tool, which enables the creation of a richer set of instructions. In both cases, the

work instructions are typically printed on paper which then travels with the parts as they are

routed throughout the factory. Interestingly, a recent survey of small and medium manufacturing

companies in North America showed that more than 80% of these companies still use paper

routers/travelers in the shop for communicating instructions and collecting actual results.

History of Digital Work Instructions

The 7 Key Insights about Digital Work Instructions

Even with the dramatic introduction of new computing technology, there are still many

nuances that must be taken into consideration when planning to incorporate DWI into your

manufacturing operation. These insights reflect knowledge gained from working closely over

the past 20 years with over 50 different companies in the aerospace, automotive, and medical

industries.

1. Digital work instructions need to be part of a structured process starting with

customer requirements

The work instructions are where the “wheel meets the pavement” in addressing your customers’

requirements. That is, if a specific customer requirement is not included as a task in the manufacturing

plans, it’s not likely going to get addressed. The planning for work instructions typically begins with

your customer’s technical data package (TDP), which contains the requirements that have to be

addressed. Thus, the real starting point for creating work instructions is the analysis and delineation

of the requirements contained in the TDP.

The Typical Components of a Technical Data Package (TDP)

You need the ability to quickly identify the part’s overall technical

requirements – what are the specific part features that you have to

make? What are the associated characteristics? What are the component

parts required? What inspecting and testing is required? -- These have to be

represented in a form that is meaningful to your organization, and assigned to

specific operations and workcenters in the plant.

In addition, since customer requirements can change, manufacturing plans and instructions are

rarely static. Instead of relying upon people’s memories and tribal knowledge, you need a digital

linkage that can help you to rapidly identify those areas in the plans impacted by the changes,

and help you to incorporate those modifications into the affected instructions.

2. The investment in hardware is no longer the driving issue for adopting digital work instructions

Until recently, getting up the muster to implement DWI has been a challenge for three major

reasons associated with the computing environment:

• The computers and infrastructure were too costly to justify the benefits – The workstations

and wired connections ran-up the cost per user to more than $4000 just for hardware. As a

result, many companies were hesitant to invest the capital required to make the jump.

• The work was relatively mobile and operators couldn’t efficiently use stationary equipment

– oftentimes an operator would have to record data on paper in one area of the shop and

then transcribe the data back at his or her fixed workstation. This eliminated many of the

benefits of electronic data collection.

• The factory personnel were not proficient at using computers – using a keyboard and a

mouse were not as pervasive as they are today, and users often complained about having

to use that “newfangled tool”. The amount of training required for data collection efforts

that were not viewed as being essential to making parts was considered a waste of time.

With the introduction of wireless, mobile computing and the pervasiveness of swipe gestures

on a touchscreen, all three of these obstacles have effectively been eliminated. This change,

along with the renewed interest in modernizing manufacturing, has provided an unprecedented

opportunity to adopt a more nimble approach for handling work instructions and data collection

on the shop floor.

3. The creation and maintenance of digital work instructions

cannot add to the burden on engineering

While 3D representations of a part along with assembly animations are informative,

in most companies the engineers and technicians do not have the time to become

technical publishers. Engineers are more concerned about ensuring that they are

addressing all the nuances of successfully completing an operation on an overall part routing.

The structuring of the TDP in terms of a company’s manufacturing processes must be an enabler

for the rapid construction of robust instructions. For example, the various elements of the work

instructions should be directly connected to the requirements in the TDP, and the engineer

should be able to construct the work instructions without worrying about all of the details of

formatting text, positioning illustrations, etc. In addition, to further improve the flow-down

efficiency, the planning that is addressed as part of estimating should be capable of also being

used for the detailed engineering effort. This greatly reduces the burden on engineering labor.

The definition of what constitutes the necessary elements of work instructions varies with the

company. For a smaller company with experienced operators, it means providing minimal

instructions, and relying upon your craftsman to be skilled enough to know what to do. At the

opposite end of the spectrum, there are companies with legions of engineers and technicians

that create meticulously-detailed step-by-step directions and publications as if they’re putting

in assembly instructions for building an IKEA television stand. Most companies need

something in between those two extremes – i.e., an approach that provides enough detail to

ensure high-quality on the shop floor, but does not require the engineer or technician to devote

an inordinate amount of time being a graphic artist.

4. Useful work instructions are not addressed by just deciding

to become a model-based enterprise

While 3D CAD enables additional automation in the enterprise, work instructions

are not just 3D views and product manufacturing information (PMI), along with

some textual directions. In reality, shop floor operators are not really interested in

rotating and querying a 3D model as much as they prefer to have specific illustrations

of the features and characteristics that are pertinent to their work.

While many consider a paragraph of text as a work instruction, it is really much more – the

pertinent views of the part, the process parameters and machine settings, a list of the necessary

fixtures and tooling, a structured listing of inspection characteristics, and so on. It is essential to

address all facets of the overall TDP, not just the geometry. This includes the multitude of perti-

nent requirements contained in the referenced material and process specifications.

5. Digital work instructions must be part of a bi-directional communication with the shop

If you remove the paper-based instructions/traveler from the shop floor and replace it with

information displayed on a digital screen, you also have to bite-off the need to provide the

operators with a means to record all of the data they are currently writing on shop paperwork.

In addition to being the means for data collection on the shop floor, the computerized device

for work instructions should be a two-way mechanism for the engineers to share useful infor-

mation with the operators, and the operators to provide useful information back to the engineers.

As an example, since the operators are most knowledgeable about the efficacy of making

parts, it makes sense to provide the operators with the ability to mark-up and comment on

specific elements of the work instructions. This is especially critical when the shop is involved

in new product introduction.

The DWI has to be a vehicle for the engineers to plan and communicate the expected data

collection. For an initial job under development, you may need the operators to collect more

detailed data. Meanwhile, after the job is running with reasonable process capability, you will

want to back-off on the data collection without creating a new set of work instructions.

6. The formal risk mitigation process has to be integrated with the creation of

work instructions

Many formal engineering and quality methodologies, such as ISO 9001, AS9100, and

Production Part Approval Process (PPAP) involve filling out various forms to help evaluate

and manage risk. These analyses include Process Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (PFMEA)

and associated Control Plans.

The resulting risk mitigation actions often affect the information contained in the work

instructions. For example, the PFMEA and Control Plans may specify an increased sampling

frequency for key characteristics; or the plans may involve control charting of critical process

variables. These are activities that have to be addressed by the operator on the shop floor.

To make this an effective process, there has to be a digital linkage that connects these neces-

sary risk management actions to the work instructions.

If these risk analysis efforts are decoupled from the actual part planning, there is little

assurance that the specific risk mitigation actions get reflected in the work instructions.

To avoid wasted effort analyzing and managing risk, the specific mitigations must be part

of the digital thread that is closely linked to the authoring of the part’s work instructions.



7. Digital work instructions are a key enabler of enhanced performance management

The primary top-level performance metrics for a manufacturing company are typically cost,

quality, and delivery. The data for these metrics comes from events that occur on the shop

floor. Hence, capturing the specific dates/times, non-conformances, process parameters,

part characteristics, etc., at the source is critical for any effort in using data mining and business

analytics. At the “source” does not mean where a non-conformance was identified, but

somewhere upstream where the actual cause occurred. This is a major issue in basic problem

solving in manufacturing. Getting reliable production data from the DWI is crucial for

addressing root causes.

The detailed data collected as part of furnishing the work instructions does not magically

become useful for analyses. This is all part of connecting the information onto the digital

thread. You need to have a meaningful framework for all of the shop data ahead of time and

have that transparently incorporated into the work instructions. In a sense, the work instructions

contain the structured requirements and allow the operators to the capture the associated

results. These become the foundation for confidently analyzing and managing factory performance.

For a manufacturing company, business typically starts with the TDP where the end customer

is formally defining the set of requirements for a part. The TDP contains various paper-based

documents that express the detailed expectations, including the geometry in the form of drawings

and 3D models, as well as specifications for materials and manufacturing processes. The receipt of

the TDP along with the Request for Quote is typically the trigger that kicks-off many of the engineering

business processes.

As the part evolves from estimating, to planning, to production, to final inspection, there are many

inter-related engineering and planning tasks which are only connected through people’s memories

and manual efforts. Many people in manufacturing used to complain about these stages being silos

with the responsible organization just throwing requirements over the wall to the next group down-

stream. Many companies now share some form of data about the parts that they have to make, but

it’s often just electronic forms of paper. That is, these are now electronic PDF documents without

any real structure or any ability to enable automation.

One way to look at it is each department in the manufacturing company gets their own opportunity

to review the TDP in its entirety as part of their effort in creating the necessary documentation for

that stage in the part lifecycle. In fact, when you move from left to right on the diagram that depicts

stages of the part lifecycle, the work typically involves someone using their experience and tribal

knowledge to add value and create the associated derivative documents. These derived docu-

ments, such as cost estimates, risk analyses, work instructions, and inspection plans, are often built

on extractions from the original TDP.

The Smart TDP and Digital Thread to make it Happen

The TDP and Typical Stages of a Part’s Lifecycle



DISCUS has fostered the approach of creating and using an integrated Smart TDP that organizes all

of the requirements and results into intelligent data structures that evolve during the various stages

of planning and execution. DISCUS ENG – Engineering Next Generation – provides tools to orga-

nize the TDP into various structures to represent the requirements and to capture the associated

results for each individual part. These structures include a Bill of Documents, Bill of Features, Bill of

Characteristics, Bill of Tools, Bill of Views, and so on.

The DISCUS patent pending technology enables the Smart TDP to connect all of these various

objects together with an understanding of the various nuances in logic. As a result, there is a thread

connecting the customer requirements all the way down to the individual work instructions on the

shop floor, which enables much more efficient flow-down of requirements and insights into shop

floor issues. With DISCUS, the TDP evolves during the lifecycle where it starts out as an Engineer-

ing-TDP; with the additions of specific operations, resources, tools, and other derivative documents,

it becomes a Manufacturing-TDP; when it’s used in production where actual results and feedback

are captured, it becomes a Job-TDP.

DISCUS ENG focuses on supporting the engineering activities that involve analyzing and using the

TDP, but typically fall outside the scope of what the commercial Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)

or Manufacturing Execution System (MES) tools address. This includes identifying part features,

ballooning characteristics, defining process parameters, establishing detailed directions, and so on.

In the simplest terms, DISCUS ENG creates a method and structure to organize a part’s requirements

and results in the context of a plant’s process capabilities. Meanwhile, DISCUS ENG works in concert

with ERP and MES by using standard integrations for sharing essential enterprise data.

These DISCUS ENG intelligent data

structures not only reduce the manual

planning efforts the first time through

the part lifecycle, they also maintain

connections to the various dependencies

to enable the efficient incorporation of

engineering changes.

DISCUS ENG Screen Automatically Generated for DWI



The Smart TDP enables the manufacturing enterprise to reduce cost and

leadtime by converting your customers’ models, drawings, and specifications

into an intelligent structure that is leveraged throughout the planning and

production lifecycle.

DISCUS ENG enables you to connect your customers’ requirements to cost estimating, risk manage-

ment, quality planning, work instructions, and performance tracking. This enables you to:

• Do a better job at estimating and using that data to make the development of

manufacturing plans more efficient.

• Provide risk management as an integral part of your engineering efforts with

out adding-on crazy amounts of paper-pushing.

• Develop visual work instructions without requiring your engineering team to

become document publishers.

• Gain real-time insights into production performance that enables you to truly

solve manufacturing issues before they become problems.

In summary, DISCUS ENG represents the next generation of tools that enable manufacturing and

quality engineering personnel to pay greater attention to detail while expending less effort.

To learn more about the engineering next generation and how it can take your

manufacturing to the next level of performance, contact [email protected]

The Potential Benefits within Your Grasp



The DISCUS Software Company, was founded in 2006 in Columbus, Ohio. To learn more about the engineering next generation and how it can take your manufacturing to the next level of performance, contact [email protected]

The DISCUS Software Company specializes in the development of software tools for accelerating manufacturing and quality engineering. DISCUS ENG is a browser and mobile-based system that helps to reduce cost and lead time by linking customer requirements to estimating, planning, and process analysis. DISCUS ENG is compatible with many of the systems used by companies such as Boeing, Ford, GE, Lockheed, and Siemens.

Contact Us Today

Web: www.DISCUSsoftware.com

Phone: 614-360-2424

Email: [email protected]

About DISCUS Software and DWI