The Lines Nobody Would Touch
An abandoned plating line rebuilt to spec; sputtering cycle cut from 20 minutes to 5.
100%VCP BACK IN PRODUCTION
+37.8%PEEL STRENGTH
×4SPUTTER THROUGHPUT
01 Background
Inside a mature plant, the hardest wins come from what others have written off.
02 Challenge
The vertical continuous plating line sat abandoned — no documentation, no vendor support, nobody willing to touch it.
03 Approach
Rebuilt the line section by section with internal resources until it ran within spec — then went after vacuum sputtering: film peel strength from 4.5 to 6.2 g/cm, cycle time from 20 minutes to 5. Earlier, a redesigned plating tank pushed Cpk from 1.25 to 1.6.
04 My role
Project lead on every improvement above.
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