Takt time

Takt time, or simply takt, is a manufacturing term to describe the required product assembly duration that is needed to match the demand. Often confused with cycle time, takt time is a tool used to design work and it measures the average time interval between the start of production of one unit and the start of production of the next unit when items are produced sequentially. For calculations, it is the time to produce parts divided by the number of parts demanded in that time interval. The takt time is based on customer demand; if a process or a production line are unable to produce at takt time, either demand leveling, additional resources, or process re-engineering is needed to ensure on-time delivery. For example, if the customer demand is 10 units per week, then, given a 40-hour workweek and steady flow through the production line, the average duration between production starts should be 4 hours, ideally. This interval is further reduced to account for things like machine downtime and scheduled employee breaks. Takt time is a borrowing of the Japanese word タクトタイム, which in turn was borrowed from the German word Taktzeit, meaning 'cycle time'. The word was likely introduced to Japan by German engineers in the 1930s. The word originates from the Latin word "tactus" meaning "touch, sense of touch, feeling". Some earlier meanings include: (16th century) "beat triggered by regular contact, clock beat", then in music "beat indicating the rhythm" and (18th century) "regular unit of note values". Takt time has played an important role in production systems even before the industrial revolution. From 16th-century shipbuilding in Venice, mass-production of Model T by Henry Ford, synchronizing airframe movement in the German aviation industry and many more. Cooperation between the German aviation industry and Mitsubishi brought takt to Japan, where Toyota incorporated it in the Toyota Production System (TPS). James P. Womack and Daniel T. Jones in The Machine That Changed the World (1990) and Lean Thinking (1996) introduced the world to the concept of "lean".