Manufacturing Terms, Explained

Machine downtime explained: planned vs unplanned, why a downtime reason code is the whole product, how to cost an hour of downtime, and what tracking actually gets you.

ERP plans in days and transacts in orders. MES executes in seconds and transacts in units. What breaks when a plant runs execution out of ERP, and where the integration costs money.

How to calculate OEE step by step: the Availability, Performance and Quality formulas, a full worked shift with real numbers, and the three mistakes that break the math.

Takt time explained: the formula, a worked calculation, why it's not the same as cycle time or lead time, and what to do when cycle time exceeds it.

A manufacturing execution system runs production on the shop floor in real time. What it actually does, where it sits between ERP and the control system, and why so many implementations fail.

OEE meaning explained: Availability x Performance x Quality, what a 'world class' 85% score really means, and why comparing OEE across plants rarely works.

CMMS handles maintenance execution on equipment you already own. EAM handles the full asset lifecycle across sites. Here's the decision rule and where each one actually fits.

Preventive fires on a calendar; predictive fires on measured condition. The economic case for each, why most plants run both, and a rule for which assets get which.

A CMMS tracks work orders, an asset register, PM schedules, parts and maintenance history. What it actually is, what it is not, and what 13 documented CMMS deployments really delivered.

Predictive maintenance triggers work from measured condition, not a calendar. The sensing-to-work-order loop, what it requires, and named results from the corpus.

First pass yield is units passing without rework divided by units started. Why it's a different number than final-inspection yield, and why a 95% line can still be losing a fifth of its output.

The five whys method traces a defect back through cause and effect until you hit something a fix can reach. A real worked chain, and the failure modes that make it unreliable in the wrong hands.

Poka-yoke prevents a defect instead of catching it afterward. The three classic types, real assembly examples, and why vision-based verification is the software version of the same idea.

A digital twin is a live, data-fed virtual model of a physical asset or process. What that means in manufacturing, what 125 documented deployments are actually used for, and how to tell a twin from a simulation.