Planning in assembly systems — A common modeling for products and resources

This paper presents a method for modeling robot and human resources in the context of assembly systems planning. In assembly systems, several redundant resources can be used to increase system flexibility. However, the “quality” of a sequence planning strongly depends on the “quality” of the system modeling. Furthermore, occurrence of unexpected events or variations in availability of resources may have significant impact on the actual planning. Instead of using simplistic models such as available or unavailable resources, the method presented in this paper proposes a more detailed modeling of resource abilities. Products and resources are considered on the same levels and matched together on a final step. The aim of this modeling is to permit analyses and to increase system flexibility.