A two-stage simulated annealing procedure for block layout problems

Abstract

Rules for setting simulated annealing control parameters are proposed for block layout problems where different material-handling devices are dynamically assigned to individual material movements as layout solutions are perturbed. Recognizing the high cost of computing materials-handling cost in this type of problem, the rules are based on adapting an existing two-stage simulated annealing procedure to accelerate convergence. Experimental results suggest that the application of these rules yields solution quality comparable with other single and two-stage simulated annealing algorithms but with significantly fewer re-evaluations of the objective function.

Keywords:

• Block layout
• Simulated annealing
• Space filling curves
• Materials-handling cost
• Volume distance

Acknowledgements

The authors express appreciation for reviewer suggestions leading to improvements in this paper.