Sleeping beauties: scheduling the production of mattresses with sequence-dependent set ups

The final step in the production of mattresses, called quilting, involves running the mattress panels through machines similar to giant sewing machines. This operation gives rise to a relatively complex machine scheduling problem which involves nonidentical machines with sequence-dependent setups. We describe this problem in the realistic shop floor environment of a well-known manufacturer of mattresses and outline a heuristic insertion algorithm for solving it. The algorithm, designed for implementation on a PC to support the daily plant operations, concurrently produces schedules for both machines and operators. We conclude with a brief summary of the implementation effort