A Framework of Part Family Formation Using Operation Sequence and Demand Similarity for Further Selection and Sequencing of Part Families Using Reconfiguration Cost

Abstract

Reconfigurable Manufacturing System (RMS) is a new manufacturing system which is designed for rapid change in structure in order to quickly adjust to production capacity and functionality with a product family in response to changes in market requirements. In RMS, formulation of part family is of paramount importance and each part family require specific system configuration. Once it is finished, the system is reconfigured to produce next part family and so forth. Reconfiguration aspects include both Physical and Logical reconfigurations which require certain standards of each work procedure. For this, a two phased approach is developed in which parts are grouped into families using operation sequence based similarity coefficient alongside part demand and then families are sequenced. An example set of parts have been classified using similarity coefficient and agglomerative hierarchical clustering procedure is used for part family formation. In next phase, optimal selection of initial and subsequent part families is carried out for minimum cost solution. This work focuses on studying of part family formulation and physical reconfiguration aspects of RMS. Optimal selection and sequencing of the identified part families will be done through optimization technique to minimize reconfigurability and underutilization of resources.