Takt time is the total CUSTOMER requirements divided by available time.
Example: You need 50 units of widgets to meet customer demand per week.
Work time is 10 hours a day, 5 days a week, Resulting takt time is 1 widget per hour or 60 min.
But what if customer demand jump to 500 widgets per week??
Well, with the same work hours available, your new takt time is 6 min.
Many managers confuse takt time with cycle time. Given the above, say you need 500 widgets this week, and your CYCLE time is 3 min. per. and you set your production line up to run at 3 min. per widget, you'll going to over produce and create waste.
If you cycle time is 10 min. and your takt time is 6 min. your not going to make your customers happy, and you need to change your process to meet the 6 min. requirement.
Questions? Clear as mud?
Great.
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Be careful of what you wish for .....
This is one of those words that has found its way around the globe and back again, adopting various mutations.
'tact' is a musical term meaning 'the stroke in keeping time' (Chambers dictionary). In volume manufacturing it's the pace, rhythm, heartbeat, rate of flow ...the interval at which pieces move through a point in the process. It's a given; a standard; something around which to plan work. The tact is based on customer demand, and the time available to meet that demand - NOT based on 'how fast can we manufacture'. If we have 8 hours a day, and need to make 20 pieces a day, we should be making one piece every 24 minutes. If available time is reduced 9through oplanned stoppages or historical efficiencies) to -say- 6 hours, we'd have to speed things up and produce a part every 18 minutes. that would be our tact.
TACT is an acronym for Total Available Cycle Time. i.e. in the example above, we have 24 minutes in which to make each part. We don't need to make them any quicker through having excess materials, people, machine capacity etc. There's no point ...because our tact is based on what we're selling, and we don't want to make stuff any faster just becasue we can ...just because we have the capability to reduce our cycle time.
Takt is the German for tact. Often used, I believe, for no good reason other than some people heard of it through Toyota (who didn't have a corresponding Japanese word) who heard of it through Junkers, who probably got it from someone else?
TAKT isn't an acronym, as far as I'm aware, but used by the sort of people who just like to capitalise things. GANTT is another favourite!
Takt Time is an example of tautology - 'words that [needlessly] say the same thing'.
So, the strict answer to your question is probably 'Total Available Cycle Time ..Time'!
I hope this is interesting ...and maybe useful. Steve Milner
TACT
Re: TACT
