2004 Volume 17 Issue 4 Pages 178-186
Recently, facility layout should be adjusted effectively to meet a dynamic change in product mix under a given system capability as product lifecycle becomes shorter. Since the total work flow depends on a selection of processing routes for all products, it is necessary in recent layout to determine not only a layout but also a set of processing routes in each period. To meet practical requirements, we should deal with different shapes and areas of facilities. Considering these three points, we propose a method in dynamic layout problem with different shapes and areas of facilities and alternative processing routes to minimize the total cost consisting of work flow costs and facility-rearrangement costs over a given planning horizon. The proposed method consists of three phases, such as a static, dynamic and modification phase. In each phase, the original layout problem is decomposed into a work flow decision problem and a layout-position decision problem. An approximate solution is obtained by solving each problem repeatedly. Some simulation experiments are demonstrated to show that the proposed method efficiently yields a near optimal layout with high accuracy.
