Conveyors worked example

Work Content with manual touch time of 14 sec / unit: a worked example

Here is what the math looks like when conditions slip. We hold every other input steady and drop manual touch time to 14 sec / unit, then walk the calculation through step by step. Add manual, automatic, walking, and inspection time to estimate total work content for a station or operator loop.

The inputs for this scenario

  • Manual touch time: 14 sec / unit (the input this scenario stresses; the baseline uses 28)
  • Operator-owned automatic wait: 12 sec / unit (held at the documented default)
  • Walking and material handling time: 7 sec / unit (held at the documented default)
  • Inspection and documentation time: 5 sec / unit (held at the documented default)

Working through the calculation

  • The calculation starts from the formula this tool documents: Total work content = manual touch time + automatic wait + walking/material handling + inspection/documentation.
  • Total work content works out to 38 sec / unit at these inputs, and this is the headline figure for the scenario.
  • Manual touch time works out to 14 sec / unit at these inputs.
  • Operator-owned automatic wait works out to 12 sec / unit at these inputs.
  • Element 3 + 4 works out to 12 sec / unit at these inputs.

How this compares with the baseline

  • Against the tool's baseline example, where manual touch time sits at 28 sec / unit and the headline result is 52 sec / unit, this scenario comes in 26.92% below the baseline at 38 sec / unit.
  • The practical read: the gap between this scenario and the baseline is entirely attributable to manual touch time, so recovering it is worth quantifying in dollars before considering equipment or staffing changes. It captures pure work content, not the line's pace — it ignores takt time, station idle time, and balancing losses, so total work content alone does not tell you how many operators you actually need.

Results at a glance

  • Total work content: 38 sec / unit (headline result)
  • Manual touch time: 14 sec / unit
  • Operator-owned automatic wait: 12 sec / unit
  • Element 3 + 4: 12 sec / unit

Run it with your numbers

  • To rerun this with your own numbers, open the live Work Content calculator, set manual touch time to your actual value, and adjust the remaining inputs to match your operation.

Last reviewed 2026-05-12.