Title: Complex plane design strategy for a responsive lean manufacturing system

Authors: N.H. Ben Fong, Robert H. Sturges

Addresses: Engineering Services, Rockwell Automation, 1201 South Second Street, Milwaukee, WI 53204, USA. ' Grado Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Durham Hall, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA

Abstract: The future success of manufacturing-based businesses depend on continuous exploration of technologies and innovative ways of thinking. Today, enterprises need to respond quickly with frequent change of product design, without carrying excess inventory and long production delays. In this paper, we introduce the Root-Locus method to study the sensitivity of the closed-loop poles location of a multistage feedback-control manufacturing system on a complex s-plane. This complex plane analysis offers a new control design strategy for production management to better predict and improve the dynamic response of particular manufacturing systems in terms of inventory build-up (leanness) and lead-time.

Keywords: feedback control; control design; root locus; responsive manufacturing; lean manufacturing; product design; complex plane analysis; production management.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCAT.2009.023939

International Journal of Computer Applications in Technology, 2009 Vol.34 No.3, pp.172 - 179

Published online: 21 Mar 2009 *

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