Ways of Increasing the Productivity in a Job-Shop Production Company DODUN Oana a * , MERTICARU Vasile b , SLĂTINEANU Laurenţiu c , NAGÎŢ Gheorghe d and NEAMŢU Constantin e Technical University “Gheorghe Asachi” of Iasi Department of Manufacturing Engineering, 59 A, D.Mangeron Blvd, Iaşi, 700050, România a oanad@tcm.tuiasi.ro, b merticaru@tcm.tuiasi.ro, c lslati@yahoo.com, d nagit@tcm.tuiasi.ro, e constantin.neamtu12@yahoo.com Keywords: mechanical workshop, increase of productivity, operation time, machine tools disposal, empirical study. Abstract. The necessity of increasing the products competitiveness is one of the main requests valid for the small and medium enterprises. A better adaptation of the companies to the needs of a market in a continuous change determined the enterprises to search and apply new technological and managerial solutions. Thus, a decrease of the manufacturing costs by diminishing the operational times due to the use of a better disposal of the machine tools in the mechanical workshop could be considered. The analysis led to the conclusion that distinct methods could be applied in order to establish an improved disposal of the machine tools, so that a higher flexibility and adaptability of the production to the requests of manufacturing of various parts is ensured. An optimization method based on the analysis of operation times on each of machine tools was appreciated as able to fulfill the needs of increase the work productivity. By taking into consideration empirical concerns some calculus for total durations of technological operations and some distinct ways of wokpieces movements in the mechanical workshop was approached. Thus, in a case study, a new disposal of the machine tools within workshop was proposed and analyzed. Introduction The last decades offered a more complex image concerning the necessity and the role of the small enterprises for the processes of manufacturing mechanical equipment and components of such an equipment. In accordance with the rules of the European Union (Commission Recommendation C(2003) 1422), a small enterprise has less than 50 employers, a turnover less than 10 millions of euros or a total balance sheet less than 10 millions of euro. If the number of employers is less than 10 and the turnover is less than 2 millions of euros, one says that there is a microenterprise. Within the small enterprises from mechanical field, there is usually a workshop in which the activity must be thus organized that mechanical parts are produced and delivered at established times. The workshop managers must organize the activity so that the parts are characterized by a quality in accordance with the prescriptions from the mechanical drawings and costs lower than the costs resulting from the contracts. One knows that usually, in the period when the contracts are prepared, a certain estimation of the parts costs is taken into consideration. The cost is the main request to whom the small enterprise and the workshop must find adequate solutions, but sometimes a high productivity is necessary, in order to ensure an efficient activity of the workshop. One can say that in the last years, the problem of adaptability of the workshop to various production requests was formulated; one of the solutions considering as offering good practical results was based on implementing the principles of lean manufacturing, so that a higher production flexibility could be ensured. As above mentioned, the workshop manager must ensure a good productivity; one knows that the productivity is estimated by the number of pieces obtained in a certain time. There are distinct ways of increasing the work productivity: the use of modern and performance machine tools, tools and devices, ensuring a high professional level of employers, use of optimal manufacturing/machining Applied Mechanics and Materials Vol. 808 (2015) pp 353-358 Submitted: 2015-06-15 © (2015) Trans Tech Publications, Switzerland Revised: 2015-07-30 doi:10.4028/www.scientific.net/AMM.808.353 Accepted: 2015-07-31 Online: 2015-11-23 All rights reserved. No part of contents of this paper may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without the written permission of Trans Tech Publications, www.ttp.net. (ID: 5.2.184.39-24/11/15,09:52:09)