Kristen and Marlon, two recent WPU graduates, own K&M, a company that produces cable assemblies.
Business has been good so Kristen and Marlon have decided to expand their product line to include a new cable product, which will be manufactured in the current facility.
They have decided to use a project management approach to bring the new product on line, and have identified 11 activities and their precedence relationships:
| Activity |
|
Predecessor |
a |
m |
b |
Crash time |
Normal Cost |
Crash Cost |
| A |
Develop product specifications |
None |
2 |
4 |
6 |
3 |
8000 |
11,000 |
| B |
Design manufacturing process |
A |
3 |
6 |
9 |
5 |
30,000 |
35,000 |
| C |
Source and purchase materials |
A |
2 |
3 |
4 |
2 |
6,000 |
6,000 |
| D |
Source and purchase tooling equipment |
B |
4 |
6 |
8 |
4 |
24,000 |
28,000 |
| E |
Receive and install tooling equipment |
D |
8 |
15 |
16 |
12 |
60,000 |
72,000 |
| F |
Receive materials |
C |
2 |
5 |
8 |
4 |
5,000 |
6,500 |
| G |
Pilot production run |
E,F |
2 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
6,000 |
6,000 |
| H |
Evaluate product design |
G |
1 |
2 |
3 |
2 |
4,000 |
4,000 |
| I |
Evaluate process performance |
G |
2 |
3 |
4 |
2 |
4,000 |
5,000 |
| J |
Write documentation report |
H,I |
2 |
4 |
6 |
2 |
4,000 |
6,400 |
| K |
Transition to manufacturing |
J |
2 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
5,000 |
5,000 |
1. Construct a network diagram
2. Calculate the expected time and variance for each of the project activities
3. Calculate the ES, EF, LS and LF times
4. Find the critical path for this project
5. Determine which activities have slack time and how much it is for each one
6. Determine the expected completion time for the project
7. Kristen and Marlon want to know the probability of completing the project in (i) 38; and, (ii) 42 weeks
8. If Kristen and Marlon want to finish their project in 36 weeks, how should they proceed?