Evolution of clustering techniques in designing cellular manufacturing systems: A state-of-art review

This paper presents a review of clustering and mathematical programming methods and their impacts on cell forming (CF) and scheduling problems. In-depth analysis is carried out by reviewing 105 dominant research papers from 1972 to 2017 available in the literature. Advantages, limitations and drawbacks of 11 clustering methods in addition to 8 meta-heuristics are also discussed. The domains of studied methods include cell forming, material transferring, voids, exceptional elements, bottleneck machines and uncertain product demands. Since most of the studied models are NP-hard, in each section of this research, a deep research on heuristics and metaheuristics beside the exact methods are provided. Outcomes of this work could determine some existing gaps in the knowledge base and provide directives for objectives of this research as well as future research which would help in clarifying many related questions in cellular manufacturing systems (CMS)

Application of Soft Computing Techniques for Cell Formation Considering Operational Time and Sequence

In response to demand in market place, discrete manufacturing firms need to adopt batch type manufacturing for incorporating continuous and rapid changes in manufacturing to gain edge over competitors. In addition, there is an increasing trend toward achieving higher level of integration between design and manufacturing functions in industries to make batch manufacturing more efficient and productive. In batch shop production environment, the cost of manufacturing is inversely proportional to batch size and the batch size determines the productivity. In real time environment, the batch size of the components is often small leading to frequent changeovers, larger machine idleness and so lesser productivity. To alleviate these problems, “Cellular Manufacturing Systems” (CMS) can be implemented to accommodate small batches without loosing much of production run time. Cellular manufacturing is an application of group technology (GT) in which similar parts are identified and grouped togeth..