A radio frequency identification-enabled real-time manufacturing execution system for one-of-a-kind production manufacturing: a case study in mould industry

One-of-a-Kind-Production (OKP) is a non-repetitive manufacturing mode that produces customised products with unique components. Due to the varying production requirements and inadequate operation experience, the unique components and related operations often causes great dynamics in the workshop execution process. Since most of the OKP companies currently adopt paper-based manual data transaction and report mechanism in workshop production process, such dynamics are hard to be timely detected and controlled, resulting in serious order delays and work-in-progress redundancies. Radio frequency identification (RFID) enables automatic and accurate object data capturing capability, and thus makes the real-time visibility and controllability possible to workshop execution process if combined with manufacturing execution system (MES). This article presents an easy-to-deploy and simple-to-use RFID-enabled MES to achieve such real-time control for typical OKP workshops. A real-life case study in a mold and die manufacturing company is presented to demonstrate how technical, social and organisational issues have been addressed in such project. A set of enabling technologies and systems that are key to the development of such RFID-enabled MES are introduced, including hardware like machine data terminal and workshop base station as well as software like scheduling and communication programmes. It is hoped that insights and lessons gained could be generalised for future efforts across small-and-medium-sized OKP manufacturers that share similar requirements.