Reliability consideration in the design and analysis of cellular manufacturing systems

A multi-objective mixed integer programming model of cellular manufacturing system (CMS) design is presented which minimizes the total system costs and maximizes the machine reliabilities along the selected processing routes. A part may be processed under different process plans, each prescribing a sequence of operations to be performed at various machines in a serial configuration. Thus, each process route is associated with a level of reliability corresponding to the machines in the selected process plan. The CMS design problem consists of assigning the machines to cells, and selecting, for each part type, the process route with the highest overall system reliability while minimizing the total costs of manufacturing operations, machine under-utilization, and inter-cell material handling. The proposed approach provides a flexible routing which ensures high overall performance of the CMS by minimizing the impact of machine failure through the provision of alternative process routes in case of any machine failure. The paper also proposes a performance evaluation criterion in terms of system availability for the parts and process plan assignments. Numerical examples are provided to demonstrate the applicability of the model.