Track: Production Planning and Management
Abstract
This paper proposes a mixed integer linear programming model to determine the best average cycle time for multi-degree cyclic scheduling in a no-wait robotic cell producing identical parts using N-machines and one robot to perform handling operations. We make a conjecture that the best average cycle time is always produced by a k-degree cyclic schedule. The problem is NP-hard in nature and is solved using a brute-force method to obtain the exact solution. A numerical example is used to analyze the model and the proposal is validated through computational results obtained. The sensitivity analysis performed based on different parameters is used to obtain insights and implications of the model.