Internship-Week 3

An interesting week of sorts, feeling more integrated within this small Hybrid Damper Department community. As I am getting more chatty and get to know more about the employees around, it's surprising to find some of the operator at a tender age (younger than me that is). To hit home a point, one of them just finished her SPM and works here while awaiting replies for her further studies' application. Well, I was informed that the basic pay for an operator isn't that much but the temptation lies in unlimited overtime (OT) or in other words an operator can't hope to survive on basic pay without OT and other means of income.

Enough gossip and let's head down to business shall we? As I am getting familiarize with the grease (one of the key ingredient in a hybrid damper) changing process, I am also subsequently exposed to the bigger picture-some tasks that technician engage daily. What am I talking about? Whenthe production quota is achieved and the assembly line is required to meet another customer's demand, assembly jigs have to be replace to fit the new product's dimensions. Consequently, a 1-3 hours complete makeover at the assembly line with calibrations focusing on the ultrasonic welding, vacuum chuck and grease dispenser. In truth, this scenario is kinda rare because big customers' purchase amount are staggering and takes weeks to finish. By my rough estimation,I am at least able to participate once before the end of my internship and twice if lady luck beckons to me.

This is where the power of record keeping comes into full play, without these data then the calibration can only be completed through trial and error. Not to say much but it's a big waste of time and material. Well, I'm not trying to learn everything at breakneck speed but I'm that kind of guy that goes with the flow. Conclusion for this week? I'm glad that I am able to pick up something new. By the way, I took some close up on the assembly jigs that I mentioned.

Internship-Week 2

For the past 2 weeks, been dropping like log few hours after dinner (not even enough time to get my food properly digested and waking up some 4 hours later and not daring to go back to dreamland). So, here I am only updating on my week 2 of my internship progress. Well, basically everything is more or less the same like the first week, except this time I get my hands on some mechanical related work. Positive contribution to the company I would say if u define learning to disassemble, clean and replace, reassemble just a single type of component as one.

Most of the time, everybody on the assembly floor is occupied with something. It took several technicians (in turns) and demos later to get the lesson through. From beginning to the end, it took me about 3 hours per component but I enjoy having something to fill up my day. For what it's worth, it is quite a learning experience. Too bad I can't be doing maintenance all day long, it would simply implies the component kept breaking down and no maintenance is not an option. That wouldn't be very productive for the assembly line at all.

On with the story, the remainder of the week I am stucked with menial duty, important but menial nonetheless in my dictionary. At least, that's what completing an inventory spare parts list is to me. Initially, I need to figure out the sequence in which I would place the parts (different sizes and manufacturers and all) in miniature drawers 5 in a row and label them accordingly. Lastly, totaling each respective amount and jot down their actual model specification by referring to their manufacturers' reference book.

Just like that, an entire week was over. In the future, I'll try and blog on a more daily basis especially on some interesting events happening. Well, that's for week 4 and onwards so let me hurry over and complete week 3.

Internship-Week 1

After my resume and attended a brief interview, I was officially aninternship member of Polymatech Malaysia located at HICOM Industrial Area, Shah Alam. Assigned to the Hybrid Damper Department (HBD) headed by Mr. Anand, engineer, his duty for me is to attempt to establish Total Product Management/Total Process Management (TPM). Well, he din't told me anything at that time only instructed me to check it out on wiki which I dutifully did (don't want to bored u with the details here). At the same time, he advises me to be aware of my safety. It's my duty to follow the rules and regulations of the work area.

As the name of the department suggested, the main production is a component namely hybrid damper. From explanation I obtained on that day and combined with further research, the hybrid damper is used mainly in car radio to absorb vibration and ensure smooth usage of the car radio. The term hybrid arise from its composition of 2 different material, Polypropylene Thermoplastic aka PP and Thermoplastic Elastomer aka TPE. However, the common name used in the industry originated from Japan- damper=Hontai and cover=Futa, for consistency purposes onwards only the Japanese name will be used. Below are some picture of finished product for company such as Kenwood and JVC. On the lower left is the Futa while the Hontai is on the lower right of the topmost picture.

There are 8 assembly lines in total for production of hybrid damper and most of them are automated, but operator assistance is required since the the machine's control system is set up to alert operators of No Good (NG) products due to failure of meeting requirements be it in weight or height and require manual override of the system. Another situation that requires operator is due to the fact mechanical vibration and other problems halts smooth operation from time to time, which require minor and sometimes major maintenance effort.

Hence, one of my main task is also the most basic knowledge taught to every single operator in the area --> to reset the system so that it is up and running again. Next, I was taught to perform simple maintenance operation on a component known as grease dispenser in which grease is the medium inside the hybrid damper absorbing vibrations. Well, it's not as hard as it sounds since it mainly involves disassembling the component and clean up all the excess grease before reassembling it up again, while the tricky part lies in replacing washers in hard to reach area. Last but not least, I was taught how to obtain and record down assembly machine settings which must be conducted daily for reference purposes in times of breakdown.

In short, it is exhilarating to participate in actual manufacturing process first hand rather than reading it up on textbook. So, the first week left me wanting more action.

bLoGGinG ExPerIeNcE = yOuTh

I am not sure who came up with the unprecedented move of introducing maintaining a blog as part and parcel of our industrial training. I am neither going to applaud nor reject this move,suffice to say some may enjoy it (new experience) and some might just well plain hate it.

At least, the university administration made the right move of not restricting the content of the blog to be only work related (since some pratically sits there and do nothing expect chit-chatting). In other words, the blog works just like any normal one with rants (just like this one) and i am probably going to post some random stuff soon aside from the real deal.

Anyways, really appreciate visitors (if any at all) for taking your time to check out my blog. Feel free to test whether my comment box is working (haha~) and leave a link to your blog, especially those dear UNITEN friends of mine doing internship that constantly updates their contents as well. This could be just the way to catch up with each other during this 3 months period and personally I don't find it half bad. I will try to set up some shortcut links to other's blog on my page, inspiration from Ah Keng, daily blogger of this house.

In the near future, I plan to post a link at my facebook account for my blog after I make it more presentable. As for now, I am content with much trial and error, so look forward to my successful attempt(s) because I hope so too! ~cheers~

Welcome to my industrial trainee life!

First time blogger here, much work in learning progress~ Hopefully up and running by the end of this weekend