Balanceable assembly lines with dynamic tool sharing and best matching decisions—a collaborative assembly framework

Abstract

A Collaborative Assembly Framework (CAF), inspired by the design principles of the Collaborative Control Theory, is developed in this article to enhance the extent of balancing of assembly lines. The notion of the CAF lies in the dynamic utilization of idle resources to eliminate bottlenecks. The CAF is composed of two modules: the first one, the Tool Sharing Protocol (TShP), makes dynamic tool-sharing decisions among fully loaded (i.e., bottleneck) and partially loaded Work Stations (WSs), and the second one, the Best Matching Protocol (BMP), dynamically matches tasks and WSs (BMP-1) and partially and fully loaded WSs for tool sharing (BMP-2). A Multi-Objective Mixed-Integer Programming model is developed for mathematical representation and a Fuzzy Goal Programming approach is applied for optimization purposes. The objectives are to minimize (i) the number of WSs, (ii) cycle time, and (iii) the total collaboration cost. The developed CAF is proven to guarantee the relative extent of balancing of assembly lines, depending on pairwise tool compatibility and tool-sharing performance. Numerical experiments on a set of small-sized case studies repeated and expanded from previous research show the superiority of the CAF over the existing non-collaborative approaches in terms of line efficiency, utilization, and balancing.

Keywords:

• Assembly line
• balanceability
• best matching
• collaboration
• tool sharing

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mohsen Moghaddam

Mohsen Moghaddam is a Ph.D. candidate at the School of Industrial Engineering and a Senior Researcher at the PRISM Center, Purdue University. His research interests are in the areas of collaborative control theory, e-Work and e-Service design, best-matching, bio-inspired design and control, theory of emergent networks, and decision support systems. Mohsen has published near 30 articles in peer-reviewed international journals and is the coauthor of Revolutionizing Collaboration through e-Work, e-Business, & e-Service, Springer Series in Automation, Collaboration, & e-Service. He has worked on various industry projects including enterprise resource planning and information management, supplier portfolio selection and risk management, distribution network design and analysis for resilience, and design of commercial decision support.

Shimon Y. Nof

Shimon Y. Nof is a Professor of Industrial Engineering at Purdue University and has held visiting positions at MIT and universities in Chile, EU, Hong Kong, Israel, Japan, and Mexico. He is Director of the NSF-industry-supported PRISM Center for Production, Robotics and Integration Software for Manufacturing and Management; a Fellow of IIE, Secretary General of IFPR; and current Chair of IFACCC—Manufacturing and Logistics Systems. He has published over 400 articles on production engineering and information/robotics engineering and management and is the author/editor of twelve books in these areas, including the Handbook of Industrial Robotics (Wiley, 1985) and the International Encyclopedia of Robotics (Wiley, 1988), both winners of the “Most Outstanding Book in Science and Engineering” award by the Association of American Publishers, Industrial Assembly (Chapman & Hall, 1997, co-authored with H-J Warnecke and W. E. Wilhelm), the Handbook of Industrial Robotics (2nd Edition, Wiley, 1999), and the Handbook of Automation (Springer, 2009). In 1999, he was elected to the Purdue Book of Great Teachers, and in 2002, he was awarded the Engelberger Medal for Robotics Education.