Microbird: high productivity for their Drummondville facility.

In 1966, the Girardin family started a business converting and customizing vans. Fifty years later, the company now known as Micro Bird Girardin has become a leader in the bus manufacturing industry, particularly school buses, thanks to its quality products and the excellence of its customer service.

In order to manage the entire manufacturing process under one roof and thus considerably reduce delivery times, Autobus Micro Bird has expanded their Drummondville building and relocated two production points there. Once the construction was completed, the next step was to proceed with the development of the production department and the warehouse which will serve not only for production but also as a central warehouse for North America.

Following the presentation of our drawings and layout proposals based on the analysis of the products, their velocity and dimensions as well as the forklifts that will be used for handling, Micro Bird entrusted MSK Canada with the mandate to make the project a reality, allowing them to maximize their storage space and their production flow.

Obviously, a project of this magnitude requires expertise but also creativity in order to find innovative solutions adapted to customer needs. This project is divided into several areas:

Zone 1: Warehouse

• Storage on conventional racking exploiting the heights (24′) of the warehouse.
• Center aisle: “handstack” racking system for very narrow aisles (VNA) with first-in, first-out (FIFO) flow.
• Marking for pedestrian zone, staging, delineations of forklift routes to help drivers and minimize the risk of damage.

Zone 2: Manufacturing workshop

• Equip the manufacturing workshop with workstations, mobile tool cabinets, and ergonomic central island.

Zone 3: Post-production

• Markings on the ground to delimit workstations and sequences for buses.

Zone 4: Receiving

• Staging area to create dedicated zones and process pallets in sequence and for inspection for quality control quarantine area.

Three major improvements emerge from this major project in which MSK Canada is very proud to have participated. First, the decrease in the number of warehouses, then an improvement of about 70% in production times and although not quantified, the client expects a marked reduction in non-value-added activities.