Changeover cost calculator

Methodology

Lost minutes = changeover minutes × changeovers in the period. Labour cost values those minutes at the operators involved and the hourly labour cost you enter. Lost contribution values the same minutes at the hourly contribution the machine would have earned had it been running — this belongs in the calculation only when the machine is the constraint, and should be entered as zero when it is not. Treating every machine's idle hour as lost revenue is the most common error in changeover business cases. Start-up scrap values the units lost settling the process after each changeover, which on some processes exceeds the time cost. Changeover cost per unit divides the cost of one changeover by the batch size, showing directly why small batches and long changeovers are incompatible. Batch size to halve unit cost simply doubles the current batch, which is the alternative to reducing changeover time — and is usually the worse one, because it adds inventory rather than removing cost. The halved-changeover saving shows what the period would save if the changeover took half as long, as a way of sizing a setup-reduction effort before committing to it. Excluded: the inventory and lead-time consequence of larger batches, quality risk after a changeover, operator learning, sequencing effects where changeover time depends on which product follows which, and any capital cost of the tooling or equipment that would make a faster changeover possible. You supply every input: this site holds no factory cost data, capacity figures, yields, cycle times or industry benchmarks, and never estimates them for you. Results are an orientation model for structuring a decision, not an industrial engineering study, a quotation, or safety, engineering or financial advice. Confirm equipment capability, staffing, process capability and cost with your own measurements before relying on them.