Real-Time Data for Line Balancing and Overall Equipment Effectiveness in Garment Sewing Lines: A Review and Operational Framework

Assembly line balancing has a long research history, and the apparel industry has been a frequent application area because sewing lines are labour-intensive, product mixes change often and operator skill varies widely. Most published applications, however, treat balancing as a planning exercise carried out before a style is loaded, using standard minute values (SMV) and an assumed operator efficiency. In practice the balance degrades within hours as absenteeism, machine stoppages, learning effects and quality rework change the effective capacity of each workstation. This paper reviews the classical line-balancing literature and its apparel applications, discusses how overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) can be adapted to labour-paced sewing lines, and proposes a framework in which line balance is monitored and corrected hour by hour using production, downtime and quality data captured at the workstation. We provide formulas, an illustrative worked example and a set of practical rules for re-balancing. The paper is a review and conceptual framework; the worked example uses hypothetical numbers for illustration only. Intelactory Working Paper Series, WP-2026-02. https://intelactory.com