A Simulation Analysis of Facility Layout Problems in Reconfigurable Manufacturing Systems

Facility layout problem in reconfigurable manufacturing systems is a vital but complex research issue, and greatly impacts the system performance. This paper dealing with layout problems considers adequately the complex characteristics of the studied manufacturing systems. The reconfigurability of manufacturing system facilities is also taken into account when formulating the layout design problem. And reconfigurable layout strategies are analyzed based on variations of products, quantity and order lead time. Given the analytical studies, a general simulation framework is proposed not only to give the outputs of the layouts and costs, but to analyze the benefits and performance of RMS.