Due to the NP-hardness of the two-sided assembly line balancing(TALB) problem, multiple constraints existing in real applications are less studied, especially when one task is involved with several constraints. In thi...Due to the NP-hardness of the two-sided assembly line balancing(TALB) problem, multiple constraints existing in real applications are less studied, especially when one task is involved with several constraints. In this paper, an effective hybrid algorithm is proposed to address the TALB problem with multiple constraints(TALB-MC). Considering the discrete attribute of TALB-MC and the continuous attribute of the standard teaching-learning-based optimization(TLBO) algorithm, the random-keys method is hired in task permutation representation, for the purpose of bridging the gap between them. Subsequently, a special mechanism for handling multiple constraints is developed. In the mechanism, the directions constraint of each task is ensured by the direction check and adjustment. The zoning constraints and the synchronism constraints are satisfied by teasing out the hidden correlations among constraints. The positional constraint is allowed to be violated to some extent in decoding and punished in cost function. Finally, with the TLBO seeking for the global optimum, the variable neighborhood search(VNS) is further hybridized to extend the local search space. The experimental results show that the proposed hybrid algorithm outperforms the late acceptance hill-climbing algorithm(LAHC) for TALB-MC in most cases, especially for large-size problems with multiple constraints, and demonstrates well balance between the exploration and the exploitation. This research proposes an effective and efficient algorithm for solving TALB-MC problem by hybridizing the TLBO and VNS.展开更多
Multi-manned assembly line,which is broadly utilized to assemble high volume products such as automobiles and trucks,allows a group of workers to assemble different tasks simultaneously in a multi-manned workstation.T...Multi-manned assembly line,which is broadly utilized to assemble high volume products such as automobiles and trucks,allows a group of workers to assemble different tasks simultaneously in a multi-manned workstation.This additional characteristic of parallel operators increases the complexity of the traditional NP-hard assembly line balancing problem.Hence,this paper formulates the Type-I multi-manned assembly line balancing problem to minimize the total number of workstations and operators,and develops an efficient migrating birds optimization algorithm embedded into an idle time reduction method.In this algorithm,a new decoding mechanism is proposed which reduces the sequence-dependent idle time by some task assignment rules;three effective neighborhoods are developed to make refinement of existing solutions in the bird improvement phases;and temperature acceptance and competitive mechanism are employed to avoid being trapped in the local optimum.Comparison experiments suggest that the new decoding and improvements are effective and the proposed algorithm outperforms the compared algorithms.展开更多
基金Supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China(Grant Nos.51275366,50875190,51305311)Specialized Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Education of China(Grant No.20134219110002)
文摘Due to the NP-hardness of the two-sided assembly line balancing(TALB) problem, multiple constraints existing in real applications are less studied, especially when one task is involved with several constraints. In this paper, an effective hybrid algorithm is proposed to address the TALB problem with multiple constraints(TALB-MC). Considering the discrete attribute of TALB-MC and the continuous attribute of the standard teaching-learning-based optimization(TLBO) algorithm, the random-keys method is hired in task permutation representation, for the purpose of bridging the gap between them. Subsequently, a special mechanism for handling multiple constraints is developed. In the mechanism, the directions constraint of each task is ensured by the direction check and adjustment. The zoning constraints and the synchronism constraints are satisfied by teasing out the hidden correlations among constraints. The positional constraint is allowed to be violated to some extent in decoding and punished in cost function. Finally, with the TLBO seeking for the global optimum, the variable neighborhood search(VNS) is further hybridized to extend the local search space. The experimental results show that the proposed hybrid algorithm outperforms the late acceptance hill-climbing algorithm(LAHC) for TALB-MC in most cases, especially for large-size problems with multiple constraints, and demonstrates well balance between the exploration and the exploitation. This research proposes an effective and efficient algorithm for solving TALB-MC problem by hybridizing the TLBO and VNS.
基金supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China(51875421,61803287).
文摘Multi-manned assembly line,which is broadly utilized to assemble high volume products such as automobiles and trucks,allows a group of workers to assemble different tasks simultaneously in a multi-manned workstation.This additional characteristic of parallel operators increases the complexity of the traditional NP-hard assembly line balancing problem.Hence,this paper formulates the Type-I multi-manned assembly line balancing problem to minimize the total number of workstations and operators,and develops an efficient migrating birds optimization algorithm embedded into an idle time reduction method.In this algorithm,a new decoding mechanism is proposed which reduces the sequence-dependent idle time by some task assignment rules;three effective neighborhoods are developed to make refinement of existing solutions in the bird improvement phases;and temperature acceptance and competitive mechanism are employed to avoid being trapped in the local optimum.Comparison experiments suggest that the new decoding and improvements are effective and the proposed algorithm outperforms the compared algorithms.
