LEAD TIME AND CYCLE TIME..

LEAD TIME and CYCLE TIME

LEAD TIME is the delay between initiation and execution of process. In simple words LEAD TIME is defined as time taken between receiving and order and delivering the product.

CYCLE TIME on the other hand is described as the total time required from beginning to end of process, it includes process time during which a unit is acted upon to bring closer to output and the waste and non value added times.

For a line assembly process cycle time is the time required for the most time taking process to complete. The most time taking process is also called the bottleneck process.

Consider the following example:

In the above time-operation distribution chart process four is the "bottleneck process" and hence determines the cycle time of the process.