Success Story Title

Yokohama Tire – Six Sigma / Finishing Department Simulation Analysis

Company Name

Yokohama Tire

Company Profile

Yokohama Tire, located in West Point, Mississippi, manufactures commercial truck tires. The plant produces dozens of SKUs of tires for steer, drive, trailer, and all axle positions.

Situation/Challenge

Ramp-ups in the target production volume resulted in growing pains as the company worked to make the necessary process adjustments to reach those targets. Making these incremental changes throughout the one million square-foot facility upset the delicate balance of scheduling and maintaining batches of perishable rubber compound. Even small disruptions in the complex and inter-dependent processes caused a variability ripple effect that made it difficult to consistently hit the new targets. Yokohama looked to Mississippi State University CAVS Extension (CAVS-E) for support in finding and addressing bottlenecks through Six Sigma methodology and simulation modeling.

Solution/MEPs Role

Under the coordination of MSU CAVS-E and led by Senior Project Engineer Adam Collins, P.E., CMBB, Yokohama initiated a multi-phase training program to equip cross-functional staff with Six Sigma Black Belt certification. Taught to follow the DMAIC process and equipped with advanced problem-solving tools, staff members were coached through projects where they were each expected to yield at least $100,000 in impact to the company. Additionally, MSU CAVS-E developed a simulation model of Yokohama’s finishing department to analyze design changes and policies that might increase throughput.

Results

The impact of Six Sigma projects and the finishing department simulation analysis has yielded $10.3 million impact to sales, cost savings, and investments by improving issues such as downtime, defects, and delays across a multitude of processes. The simulation analysis also helped validate which of multiple major re-design alternatives would be most effective in the future and identified system constraints that would have been nearly impossible to observe by other methods.

Client Testimonial

Partnering with MSU CAVS Extension has been a game-changer for our operations. Their expertise in Six Sigma and simulation modeling helped us uncover inefficiencies we couldn’t see before and empowered our team to solve them with confidence. The training and support we received not only delivered measurable results but also built a culture of continuous improvement that will benefit Yokohama for years to come.

Name of Person Providing Testimonial

Chase Elmore

Title of Person Providing Testimonial

TPS/TPM Manager