Title: Design and optimisation of single row layout problem in flexible manufacturing systems using metaheuristic algorithms

Authors: M. Saravanan; S. Ganesh Kumar; M. Rajkumar

Addresses: Department of Mechanical Engineering, SSM Institute of Engineering & Technology, Dindigul-Palani Highways, Dindigul – 624 002, India ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, SSM Institute of Engineering & Technology, Dindigul-Palani Highways, Dindigul – 624 002, India ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, RVS College of Engineering and Technology, Dindigul, India

Abstract: In the manufacturing process, single row layout is preferred for configurations in flexible manufacturing systems (FMS) because of their material handling systems for transporting materials economically. The objective is to minimise the total distance of the travel by the material handling device. In this paper, particle swarm optimisation (PSO) technique, genetic algorithm (GA), artificial immune system (AIS) algorithm are proposed for solving the single row unequal area layout problem which is validated through benchmark problems. The computational results showed that the AIS algorithm is producing good quality solutions for large sized problems when compared to other algorithms in a number of test problems. Comparative results show that the AIS algorithm produced better averaged objective function values (OFVs) than AIS and other algorithms for large sized problems.

Keywords: single row layout; flexible manufacturing systems; FMS; particle swarm optimisation; PSO; genetic algorithms; artificial immune system; AIS; layout design; layout optimisation; metaheuristics; materials handling; travel distance.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMTM.2016.077805

International Journal of Manufacturing Technology and Management, 2016 Vol.30 No.3/4, pp.196 - 215

Received: 30 Sep 2013
Accepted: 23 May 2014
Published online: 16 Jul 2016 *

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