Operating a continuous

manufacturing process

Lots of manufacturing processes don’t involve individual items. Breweries, chem-

ical manufacturers, gasoline refineries, food-processing plants, and even electri-

cal power plants that burn coal or natural gas are examples of businesses that use

continuous processes. With a continuous process, you feed material into one end

and get a steady stream of product out the other end.

When they’re running, continuous manufacturing processes tend to be highly

efficient, because the capacity of each step in the process can be sized for the same

rate of material flow, or throughput. Starting and stopping continuous processes,

however, is often slower and more expensive than starting and stopping discrete

processes.

Another common challenge in continuous manufacturing is that there is a mini-

mum amount of flow required for the process to work. It’s like a car engine that

stalls out if it falls below a certain minimum speed. Also, in continuous manufac-

turing, it’s harder to switch from making one product to start making another.

You probably need to shut the line down, clean all the equipment, and then

restart the entire line. So even though they’re generally more efficient than dis-

crete manufacturing, continuous manufacturing processes may not give you as

much flexibility to adjust your production rate or change the types of products

that you mak

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