F1 kayak time lapse, end of day 3.
The biggest driver of efficiency in my kayak building system comes from the years I taught in person. At first, these weeklong kayak building marathons ran upwards of 11 hours per day, but over the years I learned how to optimize every part of the process until we were able to build 6 kayaks in six 8 hourdays.
As an efficiency junkie, it was neat to see how tweaking the variables impacted production time. Once every ounce of time was shaved off the mechanical part of the process, I focused on the human side of things.
I learned that for every 10 feet of distance between the workbench and the student an HOUR of time is lost each day. I learned that past 5 pm productivity per unit of time drops by HALF. I learned that making sure people are eating and drinking and not feeling rushed increases productivity by 1/2 hour per day.
All this adds up to keeping individual days below 9 hrs, which is the threshold where fatigue effects start to impact the following day’s work. When it all came together it was like a woodworking symphony. I don’t teach in person anymore but my kayak building systems live on in our online video classes.
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