Title: Design of automated cellular manufacturing systems with simulation modelling: a case study

Authors: Felix T.S. Chan, B. Jayaprakash, Nelson K.H. Tang

Addresses: School of Manufacturing and Mechanical Engineering, University of South Australia, Ingle Farm, PO Box 1, The Levels, Australia. ' School of Manufacturing and Mechanical Engineering, University of South Australia, Ingle Farm, PO Box 1, The Levels, Australia. ' Management Centre, Leicester University, UK

Abstract: This paper describes a simulation study of a batch production firm which is attempting to improve productivity by applying advanced manufacturing technology (AMT) with group technology (GT) techniques. The purpose of this research work was to develop a formal proposal for producing high quality products in cellular manufacturing systems. This conversion is necessary in order to preserve the competitive edge of this manufacturing organisation. The most effective and efficient method of examining the alternatives in such a design process was to build a computer model of the facility and trial the key design variables. An efficient simulation tool was sought, that could represent all of the complexities in the design and evaluation of the proposed manufacturing system. Simulation models were developed using a software package SIMFACTORY 11.5, which is based on the concept of visual interactive simulation. A number of simulation experiments were performed to investigate the influence of various flexible manufacturing system (FMS) and cellular manufacturing system (CMS) configurations. The simulation results indicated that the performance of the different models was dependent on FMS configurations.

Keywords: cellular manufacturing systems; CMS; flexible manufacturing systems; FMS; group technology; production flow analysis; machine chain similarity coefficient; SIMFACTORY; simulation; advanced manufacturing technology; AMT; modelling; manufacturing cells.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCAT.1995.062396

International Journal of Computer Applications in Technology, 1995 Vol.8 No.1/2, pp.1 - 11

Published online: 05 Jun 2014 *

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