Simulation for manufacturing system design and operation: Literature review and analysis

With supply chains distributed across global markets, ocean container transport now is a critical element of any such supply chain. We identify key characteristics of ocean container transport from a supply chain perspective. We find that unlike continental (road) transport, service offerings tend to be consolidated in few service providers, and a strong focus exists on maximization of capital intensive resources. Based on the characteristics of ocean container transport as part of global supply chains, we list a number of relevant and challenging research areas and associated questions.

The critical role of ocean container transport in global supply chain performance

We propose a general hierarchical procedure to address real-life job shop scheduling problems. The shop typically produces a variety of products, each with its own arrival stream, its ow route through the shop and a given customer due date. The procedure first determines the manufacturing lot sizes for each product. The objective is to minimize the expected lead time, and therefore we model the production environment as a queueing network. Given these lead times, release dates are set dynamically. This in turn creates a time window for every manufacturing order in which the various operations have to be sequenced. The sequencing logic is based on an Extended Shifting Bottleneck Procedure. These three major decisions are next incorporated into a four-phase, hierarchical, operational implementation scheme. A small numerical example is used to illustrate the methodology. The final objective however is to develop a procedure that is useful for large, real-life shops. We therefore report on a real-life application.

Clips: a capacity and lead time integrated procedure for scheduling

This study presents a review of optimization models for tactical production planning. The objective of this research is to identify streams and future research directions in this field based on the different classification criteria proposed. The major findings indicate that: (1) the most popular production-planning area is master production scheduling with a big-bucket time-type period; (2) most of the considered limited resources correspond to productive resources and, to a lesser extent, to inventory capacities; (3) the consideration of backlogs, set-up times, parallel machines, overtime capacities and network-type multisite configuration stand out in terms of extensions; (4) the most widely used modelling approach is linear/integer/mixed integer linear programming solved with exact algorithms, such as branch-and-bound, in commercial MIP solvers; (5) CPLEX, C and its variants and Lindo/Lingo are the most popular development tools among solvers, programming languages and modelling languages, respectively...

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A review of discrete-time optimization models for tactical production planning

Production planning problems have been formulated and solved as optimization problems since the early 1950s, and an extensive literature has been developed. The widespread use of Enterprise Resource Planning systems and developments in information technology and scientific computing have opened the way for even wider use of these techniques in industry. In this chapter, we review the basic formulations that have been the mainstay of academic research and industrial practice for the last five decades, assess their strengths and weaknesses, and discuss a number of interesting new directions that have emerged recently. We especially focus on models that support decisions on production volumes and order release over time and highlight the related issues on determining planned lead times.

Optimization Models of Production Planning Problems

The effect of updating lead times on the performance of hierarchical planning systems

In this study we provide insights into the effectiveness of the clearing function concept in a hierarchical planning context. The clearing function is a mathematical representation of the relation between the Work-In-Process (WIP) and the throughput of a production process. We use it in a deterministic order release planning model to anticipate the dynamics of the operational level, which is subject to uncertainties. A multi-period single-item order release and scheduling problem is considered in which the delivery schedule of the orders is determined through the planned lead times, and the capacity loading decisions are separated from the order release decisions in a way so as to plan for on-time deliveries. Early or late delivery of the orders, which are released and delivered in batches, has not been considered explicitly in previous studies on clearing functions, and it significantly affects the inventory costs. Both linear and non-linear clearing functions are tested using a simulation approach. The ...

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/07408170701487997

Work-in-process clearing in supply chain operations planning

Updating planned lead times in response to changing workload levels leads to erratic ordering behaviour, resulting in even larger variability in the workload levels and flow times. This phenomenon is called lead time syndrome, and describes the cyclic interaction between adaptive planned lead times and order sizes. Although it has been conceptually defined and intuitively accepted, formal analysis with analytical evaluation of the phenomenon has not been conducted. The objective of this paper is to provide a stronger understanding of the lead time syndrome, and to give new insights into the effects of frequently updating planned lead times. We develop a two-dimensional Markov process to model a single-item production process with orders released sensitive to the planned lead time. Using matrix-geometric methods, analytical results on the utilization level and the variability in the system are presented in relation to the frequency of updating the planned lead time. Although the average utilization level is always retained, the lead time syndrome causes an increase in the average workload level and the actual flow times of the completed orders. The variability of the planned lead time increases with the update frequency except at the utilization boundaries, where the relative effect of the update frequency diminishes.

/pdf/an-explicit-analysis-of-the-lead-time-syndrome-stability-4dg27ufe6w.pdf

An explicit analysis of the lead time syndrome: stability condition and performance evaluation

Reliability and inventory levels of spare parts are major factors that determine the service level for the maintenance of machines provided by original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). In general, decisions on reliability and stock levels are made separately in practice, and academic literature offers little guidance on how to jointly make these two decisions. In order to fill in the gap in the literature and provide guidance to OEMs, we jointly model reliability and inventory problems. We consider three different service measures: aggregate fill rate, average downtime per system per year and expected total number of long downs in a year. Our models minimize the sum of holding and emergency shipment costs subject to a limited reliability improvement budget and a target service level. We develop an algorithm that considers reliability and inventory decisions simultaneously, test our solution approach on real-life and randomly generated data sets and compare the results with an approach that considers reliability and inventory decisions sequentially. Numerical results show substantial benefits of integrating reliability and inventory decisions.

https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1057%2Fjors.2012.38.pdf

Joint spare parts inventory and reliability decisions under a service constraint

• A submitted manuscript is the author's version of the article upon submission and before peer-review. There can be important differences between the submitted version and the official published version of record. People interested in the research are advised to contact the author for the final version of the publication, or visit the DOI to the publisher's website. • The final author version and the galley proof are versions of the publication after peer review. • The final published version features the final layout of the paper including the volume, issue and page numbers.

/pdf/dynamic-performance-of-hierarchical-planning-systems-3wd5rkmnz0.pdf

Barış Selçuk

Papers

The effect of updating lead times on the performance of hierarchical planning systems

Work-in-process clearing in supply chain operations planning

An explicit analysis of the lead time syndrome: stability condition and performance evaluation

Joint spare parts inventory and reliability decisions under a service constraint

Dynamic performance of hierarchical planning systems : modeling and evaluation with dynamic planned lead times