Abstract:
In all industrialized countries, the automotive sector is regarded as the locomotive of economy in terms of its contribution to economy and pioneering of the other sectors today and it is of great economic importance thanks to the value added it creates, its contribution to employment, its tax revenues, and its demand creating state in many sectors. In this sector, competition among firms is increasing rapidly and such elements as an increase in productivity, the efficient use of resources and administrative and technical organization gain great importance accordingly. To obtain a competitive advantage, it is necessary to keep up with the dynamic structure of the age and be open to change and innovations. That's why enterprises must adapt the new systems, techniques, and technologies to themselves. Based on continuous improvement and aiming at continuous development and elimination of waste, lean production is a production system which contains no unnecessary element in its structure and in which such elements as error, cost, inventory, workmanship, the development process, production area, wastage, and customer dissatisfaction are minimized. This study describes the improvement activities in the conveyor line at Toyota Motor Manufacturing Turkey where the outer body parts of vehicles are assembled in line with the understanding of lean production. Within this scope, it is aimed to determine the standards of the conveyor line specified by the automotive factory and ensure that the operators work in conformity with these standards; to increase the network rates in processes and process productivity by making detailed work analyses of the processes in the line; and to create the flexible workforce line characteristics which will enable the processes to work with complete productivity.
