Cell formation in manufacturing systems through simulated annealing: An experimental evaluation

• Published in: European journal of operational research Vol. 63; no. 3; pp. 409 - 422
• Main Authors: Venugopal, V., Narendran, T.T.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Amsterdam Elsevier B.V 24.12.1992; Elsevier; Elsevier Sequoia S.A
• Series: European Journal of Operational Research
• Subjects: Algorithms; Applied sciences; Combinatorial mathematics; Computational complexity; Computer science; control theory; systems; Control theory. Systems; Design; Exact sciences and technology; group technology; Machine components; machine-component grouping; Manufacturing cells; Markov analysis; Operations research; Optimization; Process control. Computer integrated manufacturing; Simulated annealing; Simulation; group technology; Simulated annealing; machine-component grouping; Production system; Group technology; Experimental result; Algorithm performance; Cellular manufacturing; Grouping; Experimental study; Algorithm
• ISSN: 0377-2217; 1872-6860
• DOI: 10.1016/0377-2217(92)90158-6

Simulated annealing is a general random search method for finding near-global optimal solutions for optimization problems and, in particular, for certain NP-complete problems in combinatorial optimization. This paper presents an algorithm based on simulated annealing to solve the machine-component grouping problem for the design of cells in a manufacturing system. The proposed algorithm has been tested on sample problems and its sensitivity to some of its parameters, investigated. When compared with the K-means algorithm, the algorithm fares better for large problems. It is also easy to implement.