Off-site manufacturing systems development in timber house building : Towards mass customization-oriented manufacturing

Sammanfattning: The need for housing in Sweden has been showing a constant increase over the past couple of years. However, this situation might change in 2018 since there are indications that the increase in demand will reach its peak. On the other hand, the use of timber as a load bearing structure has become more popular in the multi-family house building sector. It is competing with concrete and steel frames, and its market share might even reach 50% by the year of 2025. Adding the involvement of customers in house design decisions and a high level of customization, the conclusion is that timber house building must continue the development towards mass customization. There is a lack of knowledge on how mass customization is developed and implemented regarding off-site manufacturing systems. In this thesis, a contribution is made to manufacturing system development in timber house building by proposing a novel approach to aligning off-site manufacturing systems to the requirements of production strategy, market needs, product design, and manufacturing processes. The proposed conceptual framework is a synthesis of the knowledge gained from three empirical studies and different methods found in theories of changeable manufacturing systems, mass customization, and manufacturing system development. The research purpose addressed by the presented work, is to increase the knowledge on how the development potential of off-site manufacturing systems can be identified in mass customization-oriented timber house building. Case study research was applied to gather the empirical data. The data collection and analysis methods used in the empirical studies can be useful when discussing the potential improvements. However, these data are not comprehensive enough in terms of presenting a holistic view of off-site manufacturing and consideration of the market as well as variation in product and processes. Therefore, a comprehensive set of requirements is proposed in the conceptual framework together with a step by step description of how the development potential of off-site manufacturing systems can be identified.