A Heuristic Method for Two-sided Assembly Line Balancing Problem

A two-sided assembly line is typically found in plants producing large-sized products. Its advantages over a one-sided line and the difficulties faced in two-sided line balancing problems were discussed. A mathematical model for two-ALB problem was suggested. A modification of the “ranked positional weight” method, namely two-ALB RPW for two-ALB problems was developed. Experiments were carried out to verify the performance of the proposed method and the results show that it is effective in solving two-sided assembly line balancing problems.

An efficient migrating birds optimization algorithm with idle time reduction for Type-I multi-manned assembly line balancing problem

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.

Assembly Line Balancing Based on Double Chromosome Genetic Algorithm

Aiming at assembly line balancing problem,a double chromosome genetic algorithm(DCGA)is proposed to avoid trapping in local optimum,which is a disadvantage of standard genetic algorithm(SGA).In this algorithm,there are two chromosomes of each individual,and the better one,regarded as dominant chromosome,determines the fitness.Dominant chromosome keeps excellent gene segments to speed up the convergence,and recessive chromosome maintains population diversity to get better global search ability to avoid local optimal solution.When the amounts of chromosomes are equal,the population size of DCGA is half that of SGA,which significantly reduces evolutionary time.Finally,the effectiveness is verified by experiments.

A scenario relaxation algorithm for finite scenario based robust assembly line balancing

A balancing problem for a mixed model assembly line with uncertain task processmg Ume anO daily model mixed changes is considered, and the objective is to minimize the work variances between stations in the line. For the balancing problem for the scenario-based robust assembly line with a finitely large number of potential scenarios, the direct solution methodology considering all potential scenarios is quite time-consuming. A scenario relaxation algorithm that embeds genetic al- gorithm is developed. This new algorithm guarantees termination at an optimal robust solution with relatively short running time, and makes it possible to solve robust problems with large quantities of potential scenarios. Extensive computational results are reported to show the efficiency and effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.

CONCURRENT PRODUCT PORTFOLIO PLANNING AND MIXED PRODUCT ASSEMBLY LINE BALANCING

Reconfigurable products and manufacturing systems have enabled manufacturers to provide ＂cost effective＂ variety to the market. In spite of these new technologies, the expense of manufacturing makes it infeasible to supply all the possible variants to the market for some industries. Therefore, the determination of the right number of product variantsto offer in the product portfolios becomes an important consideration. The product portfolio planning problem had been independently well studied from marketing and engineering perspectives. However, advantages can be gained from using a concurrent marketing and engineering approach. Concurrent product development strategies specifically for reconfigurable products and manufacturing systems can allow manufacturers to select best product portfolios from marketing, product design and manufacturing perspectives. A methodology for the concurrent design of a product portfolio and assembly system is presented. The objective of the concurrent product portfolio planning and assembly system design problem is to obtain the product variants that will make up the product portfolio such that oversupply of optional modules is minimized and the assembly line efficiency is maximized. Explicit design of the assembly system is obtained during the solution of the problem. It is assumed that the demand for optional modules and the assembly times for these modules are known a priori. A genetic algorithm is used in the solution of the problem. The basic premise of this methodology is that the selected product portfolio has a significant impact on the solution of the assembly line balancing problem. An example is used to validate this hypothesis. The example is then further developed to demonstrate how the methodology can be used to obtain the optimal product portfolio. This approach is intended for use by manufacturers during the early design stages of product family design.

Heuristics for Mixed Model Assembly Line Balancing Problem with Sequencing

The growing global competition compels organizations to use many productivity improvement techniques. In this direction, assembly line balancing helps an organization to design its assembly line such that its balancing efficiency is maximized. If the organization assembles more than one model in the same line, then the objective is to maximize the average balancing efficiency of the models of the mixed model assembly line balancing problem. Maximization of average balancing efficiency of the models along with minimization of makespan of sequencing models forms a multi-objective function. This is a realistic objective function which combines the balancing efficiency and makespan. This assembly line balancing problem with multi-objective comes under combinatorial category. Hence, development of meta-heuristic is inevitable. In this paper, an attempt has been made to develop three genetic algorithms for the mixed model assembly line balancing problem such that the average balancing efficiency of the model is maximized and the makespan of sequencing the models is minimized. Finally, these three algorithms and another algorithm in literature modified to solve the mixed-model assembly line balancing problem are compared in terms of the stated multi-objective function using a randomly generated set of problems through a complete factorial experiment.

A Modified Multi-Agent System for Simple Assembly Line Balancing

In this paper, a modified multi-agent system for assembly line balancing is proposed. Each worker in the assembly line is regarded as an agent, and two neighboring agents exchange information about the allocated tasks. To balance the workload, an agent with a smaller workload sends a request message to his/her neighboring agent, who has a larger workload, to exchange tasks between them. Without any centralized control mechanism, each agent behaves to achieve their goal, which is to balance the workload. A tabu list and cooling control are also incorporated. However, the effectiveness of the previous system is limited, and the system depends on problems to be solved. As such, a modified system is proposed. In the proposed system, the cycle time is used when considering the proposal of exchange of allocated tasks instead of the task time allocated to the neighboring workers. Also, in the proposed system, the length of tabu list is determined dynamically based on the current number of possible exchanges, and the best cycle time in the search with cooling at medium speed is recorded for the second search that is finished when the current cycle time reaches the recorded cycle time. The effectiveness of the modified system is investigated by solving problems for various conditions. The results show that the proposed system is effective regardless of the problems that are encountered.

Effective Hybrid Teaching-learning-based Optimization Algorithm for Balancing Two-sided Assembly Lines with Multiple Constraints

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 fimction. 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.

Strategic Robust Mixed Model Assembly Line Balancing Based on Scenario Planning

Assembly line balancing involves assigning a series of task elements to uniform sequential stations with certain restrictions. Decision makers often discover that a task assignment which is optimal with respect to a deterministic or stochastic/fuzzy model yields quite poor performance in reality. In real environments, assembly line balancing robustness is a more appropriate decision selection guide. A robust model based on the α worst case scenario is developed to compensate for the drawbacks of traditional robust criteria. A robust genetic algorithm is used to solve the problem. Comprehensive computational experiments to study the effect of the solution procedure show that the model generates more flexible robust solutions. Careful tuning the value of α allows the decision maker to balance robustness and conservativeness of as- sembly line task element assignments.

Pareto lexicographic a-robust approach and its application in robust multi objective assembly line balancing problem

Robustness in most of the literature is associated with rain-max or min-max regret criteria. However, these criteria of robustness are conservative and therefore recently new criteria called, lexicographic a- robust method has been introduced in literature which defines the robust solution as a set of solutions whose quality orjth largest cost is not worse than the best possible jth largest cost in all scenarios. These criteria might be significant for robust optimization of single objective optimization problems. However, in real optimization problems, two or more than two conflicting objectives are desired to optimize concurrently and solution of multi objective optimization problems exists in the form of a set of solutions called Pareto solutions and from these solutions it might be difficult to decide which Pareto solution can satisfy rain-max, min-max regret or lexico- graphic a-robust criteria by considering multiple objectives simultaneously. Therefore, lexicographic a-robust method which is a recently introduced method in literature is extended in the current research for Pareto solutions. The proposed method called Pareto lexicographic a-robust approach can define Pareto lexicographic a-robust solu- tions from different scenarios by considering multiple objectives simultaneously. A simple example and an application of the proposed method on a simple problem of multi objective optimization of simple assembly line balancing problem with task time uncertainty is presented to get their robust solutions. The presented method can be significant to implement on different multi objective robust optimization problems containing uncertainty.

A Multi-Object Genetic Algorithm for the Assembly Line Balance Optimization in Garment Flexible Job Shop Scheduling

Numerous clothing enterprises in the market have a relatively low efficiency of assembly line planning due to insufficient optimization of bottleneck stations.As a result,the production efficiency of the enterprise is not high,and the production organization is not up to expectations.Aiming at the problem of flexible process route planning in garment workshops,a multi-object genetic algorithm is proposed to solve the assembly line bal-ance optimization problem and minimize the machine adjustment path.The encoding method adopts the object-oriented path representation method,and the initial population is generated by random topology sorting based on an in-degree selection mechanism.The multi-object genetic algorithm improves the mutation and crossover operations according to the characteristics of the clothing process to avoid the generation of invalid offspring.In the iterative process,the bottleneck station is optimized by reasonable process splitting,and process allocation conforms to the strict limit of the station on the number of machines in order to improve the compilation efficiency.The effectiveness and feasibility of the multi-object genetic algorithm are proven by the analysis of clothing cases.Compared with the artificial allocation process,the compilation efficiency of MOGA is increased by more than 15%and completes the optimization of the minimum machine adjustment path.The results are in line with the expected optimization effect.