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Flow shop batching and scheduling with sequence-dependent setup times

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Abstract

This paper addresses the flow shop batching and scheduling problem where sequence-dependent family setup times are present and the objective is to minimize makespan. We consider violating the group technology assumption by dividing product families into batches. In order to reduce setup times, inconsistent batches are formed on different machines, which lead to non-permutation schedules. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that the splitting of job families into inconsistent batches has been considered in a flow shop system. A tabu search algorithm is developed which contains several neighbourhood functions, double tabu lists and a multilevel diversification structure. Compared to the state-of-the-art meta-heuristics for this problem, the proposed tabu search algorithm achieves further improvement when the group scheduling assumption is dropped. Also, various experiments conducted on the benchmark problem instances confirm the benefits of batching. Therefore, it will be prudent for the practitioners to consider adopting inconsistent batches and non-permutation schedules to improve their operational efficiency within a reasonable amount of computational effort.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the three anonymous referees for their constructive comments and suggestions. The authors are grateful to Dipl.-Inf. Dirk Schöbel for providing technical computing support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Business Management and Economics, Technische Universitaet Dresden, Dresden , 01062, Germany

    Liji Shen & Udo Buscher

  2. College of Business Administration, University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, AL , 35763, USA

    Jatinder N. D. Gupta

Authors
  1. Liji Shen
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  2. Jatinder N. D. Gupta
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  3. Udo Buscher
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Correspondence to Liji Shen.

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Shen, L., Gupta, J.N.D. & Buscher, U. Flow shop batching and scheduling with sequence-dependent setup times. J Sched 17, 353–370 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10951-014-0369-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10951-014-0369-x

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