Control point policy: part 1–efficiency within make-to-order environments

The recognition of the desire for punctual delivery of products has lead to the use of the service level as a common performance criterion for measuring the proportion of products that meet due dates specified by the customer. To successfully increase the service level, a manufacturing system may respond more quickly to orders by reducing the levels of in-process inventory in the system and hence decrease throughput times. This paper examines the use of the recently developed Control Point Policy (CPP) in improving service levels in re-entrant, ‘make-to-order’ manufacturing systems and compares its effectiveness with that of the Critical Ratio scheduling rule. Simulation studies have been undertaken to provide insight into how and when to apply the CPP policy within such environments with results indicating that, in cases requiring small storage areas between machines, the CPP results in better service level performance.     

Buffer sizing approach with dependence assumption between activities in critical chain scheduling

The critical chain/buffer management (CC/BM) methodology, proposed by E.M. Goldratt [1997. Critical chain. New York: The North River Press], introduced the concept of buffers to protect the critical chain against the disruptions. The buffer sizes reflect the uncertainty in the estimation of project duration and affect the project scheduling performance. However, the most current buffer sizing approaches make the assumption that project activity durations are independent. In this paper, the effects of the dependence between activities on project duration performances are analysed, a method for determining buffer sizes with dependence assumption between activities is introduced. Specifically, two definitions reflecting dependence, which are the dependence degree and the dependence factor, are integrated into the formulation of buffer sizing approach. The suggested method is tested and compared with the methods with independence assumption, the root square error method, the adaptive procedure with resource tightness and the adaptive procedure with density. The results indicate that the methods with independence assumption may underestimate the buffer size when at least one of the two definitions is at a high level, while the suggested method can provide better protection in such circumstances.     

An engineering method for complex structural optimization involving both size and topology design variables

This work presents an engineering method for optimizing structures made of bars, beams, plates, or a combination of those components. Corresponding problems involve both continuous (size) and discrete (topology) variables. Using a branched multipoint approximate function, which involves such mixed variables, a series of sequential approximate problems are constructed to make the primal problem explicit. To solve the approximate problems, genetic algorithm (GA) is utilized to optimize discrete variables, and when calculating individual fitness values in GA, a second-level approximate problem only involving retained continuous variables is built to optimize continuous variables. The solution to the second-level approximate problem can be easily obtained with dual methods. Structural analyses are only needed before improving the branched approximate functions in the iteration cycles. The method aims at optimal design of discrete structures consisting of bars, beams, plates, or other components. Numerical examples are given to illustrate its effectiveness, including frame topology optimization, layout optimization of stiffeners modeled with beams or shells, concurrent layout optimization of beam and shell components, and an application in a microsatellite structure. Optimization results show that the number of structural analyses is dramatically decreased when compared with pure GA while even comparable to pure sizing optimization.     

A genetic algorithm heuristic approach to general outsourcing capacitated production planning problems

This paper addresses a dynamic capacitated production planning (CPP) problem with consideration of outsourcing. Specifically, the outsourcing problem considered in this paper has the following features: (1) all demands are met by production or outsourcing without postponement or backlog, (2) production, inventory, and outsourcing levels all have a limit, and (3) the cost functions are considered arbitrarily and time-varying. These features come together, leading to a so-called general outsourcing CPP problem. In our previous work, an algorithm with pseudo-polynomial time complexity was developed, which includes a formation of a feasible solution region and then a search procedure using dynamic programming techniques. Due to the computational complexity with such an approach, only small and medium problems can be solved in a practical sense. In this paper, we present a genetic algorithm (GA) approach to the same problem. The novelty of this GA approach is that the idea of the feasible solution region is used as a heuristic to guide the searching process. We present a computational experiment to show the effectiveness of the proposed approach.     

Performance evaluation of a make-tO-stock production line with a two-parameter-per-machine policy: the control point policy

This paper presents a decomposition method for evaluating the performance of a production line with finite buffers controlled by the Control Point Policy (CPP), a policy with two parameters per machine. (One parameter is the buffer size; the other is a local hedging point.) Policies with two parameters per machine show very good performance while remaining simple to use. However, decomposition methods have not yet been developed for their analysis. We consider a production line, with exponentially distributed processing, failure, and repair times, controlled by a CPP. We decompose this line into two-machine CPP-controlled lines, which considerably simplifies the decomposition equations. Furthermore, the information loops are then included in the building blocks, and can be solved numerically. A numerical study shows that the method is accurate.     

基于灰色关键链的项目进度管理方法及应用

针对项目或者任务完成时间具有外延确定而内涵不确定的特点,应用灰色系统思想提出了基于灰色关键链的项目进度管理方法.设计的灰色关键链方法通过改进关键链中缓冲时间的取法,以设置合理的输送缓冲时间(Feeding Buffer)及项目缓冲时间(Project Buffer).最后,通过实例给出了该方法的应用步骤,并将计划评审技术、关键链与灰色关键链进行了比较.     

Controlled production planning for Just-In-Time short-run suppliers

In the face of growing global competitiveness it is necessary for US manufacturers to manage their limited resources in quite the opposite manner of the way they have been managed in the past. Just-In-Time (JIT) is a practice which, by eliminating waste, improving quality, and increasing productivity, has helped manufacturers meet the competition. The core requirement of JIT in practice, however, is the timely delivery of quality products. This requirement has exerted significant economic pressure on short-run JIT suppliers that provide low-volume, diversified products. This paper presents a means by which JIT methods and Statistical Process Control may be applied jointly to short run production in an environment with demand uncertainties. The purpose of this study is threefold: (1) to examine the cost structure of short-run production, (2) to propose the application of controlled production planning, and (3) to discuss the effect of controlled production planning on the cost structure of JIT suppliers. This study examines the economic impact of JIT demands on the cost structure of short-run production and proposes Controlled Production Planning (CPP) for generating signals for delivery failures or overproduction plans. Establishing CPP minimizes short-term production plan fluctuations, reduces inventory based on the market situation, and reduces the total cost of production. Using a computer simulation we demonstrate that CPP is a viable method for achieving these inventory and production goals. Based on this proposal, three inventory strategies are recommended to short-run suppliers in order to minimize their operating costs under different business conditions. The first strategy uses CPP to determine an inventory cap that requires the maintenance of an average level of stock as a lower control limit to cope with short-run demand fluctuation. This strategy is applicable to a business condition with high product quality and low flexibility to respond to fluctuating demands. The second strategy is zero inventory exercised by sole suppliers offering standard products. The third strategy is a flexible production system combined with zero inventory, which is applicable to suppliers facing strong competition without the market position to absorb their production surplus.     

基于鱼骨型仓库布局的多车拣选路径问题优化

为了推动鱼骨型仓库在实际场景下的应用,针对鱼骨型仓库布局下的拣货路径优化问题,构建待拣货点距离计算模型和以有载重、容积限制的多车拣货距离最短为总目标的拣选路径优化模型。考虑遗传算法(GA)全局搜索能力强、粒子群算法(GAPSO)收敛速度快以及蚁群算法(ACO)较强的局部寻优能力,提出一种解决拣选路径优化模型的混合算法(GA-PSO-ACO)。通过不同订单规模的仿真实验,得出该混合算法在适应度值、迭代次数、收敛速度等方面均优于GA算法和GAPSO算法,且在订单规模较大时,平均适应度值约降低8%,有效缩短了总拣选距离,验证了混合算法在解决鱼骨型仓库布局下的拣货路径问题的先进性和有效性,为解决此类仓库内部的拣货路径问题提供新的解决方法和思路。     

Effective expediting to improve project due date and cost performance through buffer management

The rapidly changing marketplace together with the increasing complexity of contemporary projects makes it more likely that project activities will have uncertain durations, incurring a generally low probability of on-time delivery. Thus, project control that aims to track the project performance and to expedite relevant activities when necessary has become the main aspect within the scope of project management in order to ensure a successful scheduling outcome. The Critical Chain Scheduling and Buffer Management (CC/BM) has shown to provide a popular approach to build robust project schedules and to offer a valuable control tool for coping with schedule variability. However, the most current buffer management (BM) practice faces a problem of neglecting the cost information when taking expediting actions. In view of this defect, we introduce a new control procedure on the basis of CC/BM that evaluates the probability of successful project completion relative to the cost of crashing and that determines when to expedite which activities in a cost-effective manner. Results of an experimental application of the proposed method present its relative dominance over the currently widely adopted BM approach with respect to project time and cost performance.     

ILGAR

ILGAR — a flexible and scalable process for the deposition of thin metal sulfide films ILGAR ( I on L ayer GA s R eaction) is a patented deposition technique for metal sulfide layers. This method has been developed at the Helmholtz‐Zentrum Berlin für Materialien und Energie (HZB). This article introduces the ILGAR process and the application possibilities. One focus will be ILGAR indium sulfide (In₂S₃) as buffer layer in chalcopyrite‐based thin film solar cells. ILGAR In₂S₃ is very suitable to replace the toxic cadmium sulfide (CdS) layer (the industrial standard buffer material in chalcopyrite solarcells). ILGAR has been awarded the German High Tech Champion price 2011 by the Fraunhofer Gesellschaft.     

骨修复用聚磷酸钙/壳聚糖复合材料的合成及其细胞相容性

采用自行设计的悬浮液热分散复合法, 用硬脂酸(Sad)作为致孔剂, 通过复合-沉析-浸溶-漂洗-干燥的工艺制备大孔聚磷酸钙/壳聚糖(CPP/CS)复合材料棒材。将复合悬液滴入凝固液中, 经浸泡-漂洗-干燥的工艺制备CPP/CS微孔复合材料颗粒。用红外光谱及扫描电镜对复合材料进行了表征。实验表明, 合成的复合材料中CS的氨基和CPP的P O基生成了氢键, 其形态结构致密均匀, 大孔复合材料棒材的孔径为50~300μm, 孔隙率为71.13%; 微孔复合材料颗粒的孔径为10~100μm, 孔隙率为40.76%。研究了2种工艺不同配比复合材料的细胞相容性, 发现: 大孔复合材料棒材的细胞相容性比微孔复合材料颗粒好, 复合材料中随着CPP含量的增加, 细胞相容性增加, 当复合材料中CPP和CS的质量比为7/3时, 复合材料的细胞相容性较好。CPP与CS复合可以提高其压缩强度, 原料质量配比为CPP/CS＝7/3时, 复合材料的强度最高。      

Closed loop control-based real-time dispatching heuristic on parallel batch machines with incompatible job families and dynamic arrivals

In this paper, a real-time closed loop control dispatching heuristic (RCLC) algorithm is proposed to address the scheduling problem of parallel batch machines with incompatible job families, limited waiting time constraints, re-entrant flow and dynamic arrivals in the diffusion and oxidation areas of a semiconductor wafer fabrication system (SWFS), which is known to be strongly NP-hard. The basis of this algorithm is the information of lots in the buffer when the parallel batch machines are idle and available. In RCLC, if the number of any family lots is less than the maximum batch size, the dispatching heuristic can be seen as a pull–pull–push–push (P⁴) strategy; otherwise, a genetic algorithm (GA). A look-itself strategy, P⁴ strategy and GA can build a closed loop control system. The experiments are implemented on the Petri nets-based real-time scheduling simulation platform of SWFS, and demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposed method.     

Scheduling of flexible manufacturing systems based on Petri nets and hybrid heuristic search

This paper proposes and evaluates a hybrid search strategy and its application to flexible manufacturing system (FMS) scheduling in a Petri net framework. Petri nets can concisely model multiple lot sizes for each job, the strict precedence constraint, multiple kinds of resources, and concurrent activities. To cope with the complexities for FMS scheduling, this paper presents a hybrid heuristic search strategy, which combines the heuristic A* strategy with the DF strategy based on the execution of the Petri nets. The search scheme can invoke quicker termination conditions, and the quality of the search result is controllable. To demonstrate this, the scheduling results are derived and evaluated through a simple FMS with multiple lot sizes for each job. The algorithm is also applied to a set of randomly generated more complex FMSs with such characteristics as limited buffer sizes, multiple resources, and alternative routings.     

Fatigue crack growth with fiber failure in metal-matrix composites

Crack growth during the fatigue of fiber-reinforced metal-matrix composites can be predicted analytically by determining the reduction in the crack tip stress intensity range resulting from fiber bridging. Various canonical functions exist that relate the crack tip stress intensity range to bridged crack geometries and loading for both infinite and finite width specimens; however, comprehensive crack growth predictions incorporating fiber failure require knowledge of the maximum fiber stress in the bridged zone for all notch sizes and crack lengths. Previous modeling efforts have been extended to predict complete growth curves with fiber failure for specimens of finite width. Functions for maximum fiber stresses in the bridged zone are presented here for a center crack in tension and edge cracks in tension and bending. The rapid increase in crack growth when fibers fail emphasizes the importance of determining the loads and notch sizes that mark the beginning of fiber failure. Critical loads for given notch sizes and fiber strengths are easily determined for finite width specimens using the functions presented in this work.     

Effective hybrid genetic algorithm for minimizing makespan on a single-batch-processing machine with non-identical job sizes

The paper addresses minimizing makespan by a genetic algorithm (GA) for scheduling jobs with non-identical sizes on a single-batch-processing machine. A batch-processing machine can process up to B jobs simultaneously. The processing time of a batch is equal to the longest processing time among all jobs in the batch. Two different GAs are proposed based on different encoding schemes. The first is a sequence-based GA (SGA) that generates random sequences of jobs using GA operators and applies the batch first fit heuristic to group the jobs. The second is a batch-based hybrid GA (BHGA) that generates random batches of jobs using GA operators and ensures feasibility by using knowledge of the problem based on a heuristic procedure. A greedy local search heuristic based on the problem characteristics is hybridized with a BHGA that has the ability of steering efficiently the search toward the optimal or near-optimal schedules. The performance of proposed GAs is compared with a simulated annealing (SA) approach proposed by Melouk et al. (Melouk, S., Damodaran, P. and Chang, P.Y., Minimizing makespan for single machine batch processing with non-identical job sizes using simulated annealing. Int. J. Prod. Econ., 2004, 87, 141–147) and also against a modified lower bound proposed for the problem. Computational results show that BHGA performs considerably well compared with the modified lower bound and significantly outperforms the SGA and SA in terms of both quality of solutions and required runtimes.     

Effect of potassium and magnesium doping on mechanical properties and in vitro degradation behavior of calcium polyphosphate

Porous crystalline calcium polyphosphate (CPP) is under investigation as a candidate bone substitute/augmentation material including incorporation in implants intended for repair of osteochondral defects. Previous studies of biphasic implants (i.e., cartilage-CPP constructs) for osteochondral defect repair have shown that porous CPP has the required features for this application including the bone substitute portion of the biphasic implant, but the porous CPP degradation rate is lower than preferred. This study investigated the effect of doping with MgCO₃, MgCl₂, K₂CO₃, or KCl at a molar ratio of M/Ca = 0.02 on properties and in vitro degradation behavior of CPP. Doping with magnesium or potassium resulted in changes in the crystallization and melting temperatures, which required adjustment of the sintering conditions for forming samples of the desired porosity level. This, in turn, resulted in higher compressive and diametral compressive (i.e., tensile) strengths of the porous-doped CPP samples compared with undoped CPP prepared to a given porosity level. For samples prepared in this study, the chemical degradation rate of porous Mg-doped CPP samples was the fastest while K doping resulted in a lower degradation rate than undoped CPP.     

纯聚丙烯热法铝塑复合膜及其热封性能

目的 为了提高铝塑复合膜的热封和抗腐蚀性能,提出一种新的基于纯聚丙烯(CPP)的热法铝塑膜制备方法。方法 不同于传统的干法和热法工艺,通过在铝箔表面沉积纳米金属防腐涂层直接实现纯CPP与铝箔的黏结,解决单层纯CPP在铝箔表面不能直接淋膜热复合的技术难题。对铝箔和铝塑膜的表面形貌,以及铝塑膜热力学性能、热封性能进行研究。结果 纳米涂层工艺提高了铝箔表面粗糙度,增大了铝箔和CPP之间的接触面积。热封测试的实验结果表明纯CPP热法铝塑膜的一封热封强度超过了140 N/15 mm,在电解液浸泡后的二封热封强度仍接近于140 N/15 mm。结论 纯CPP热法铝塑膜具备良好的热封和耐电解液腐蚀性能,在动力电池领域具备应用前景。     

烧结温度对焦磷酸钙/Ti-35Nb-7Zr复合材料微观组织及力学性能的影响

为改善β型Ti-Nb-Zr合金的生物活性,添加20wt%的焦磷酸钙(CPP)生物陶瓷,利用放电等离子烧结技术制备20CPP/Ti-35Nb-7Zr生物复合材料。借助XRD、SEM及力学测试方法等研究不同烧结温度(1 000~1 200℃)下复合材料的微观组织及力学性能,揭示其组织演变对力学性能的影响机制。结果表明:20CPP/Ti-35Nb-7Zr复合材料主要由β-Ti相基体、少量残留α-Ti相及金属-陶瓷相(CaTiO_3、Ti_2O、CaO、CaZrO_3和TixPy)组成;随着烧结温度升高,复合材料中β-Ti相和金属-陶瓷相逐渐增多;金属与陶瓷之间的剧烈反应导致金属-陶瓷相的形态结构发生变化,复合材料中金属-陶瓷相从颗粒状析出物演变成连续网状组织,起到割裂基体的作用。20CPP/Ti-35Nb-7Zr复合材料的压缩弹性模量和抗压强度随着烧结温度的升高而增大,其中压缩弹性模量从64.0GPa增加至71.4GPa,金属-陶瓷相形态结构变化起主导作用。因此,控制20CPP/Ti-Nb-Zr复合材料中金属-陶瓷相的形态结构将有利于改善其力学性能。     

An inverse geometry problem for the localisation of skin tumours by thermal analysis

In this paper, the dual reciprocity method (DRM) is coupled to a genetic algorithm (GA) in an inverse procedure through which the size and location of a skin tumour may be obtained from temperature measurements at the skin surface. The GA is an evolutionary process which does not require the calculation of sensitivities, search directions or the definition of initial guesses. The DRM in this case requires no internal nodes. It is also shown that the DRM approximation function used is not an important factor for the problem considered here. Results are presented for tumours of different sizes and positions in relation to the skin surface.     

Plasma modification of polyolefin surfaces

In order to functionalize the surface of blown low‐density polyethylene (LDPE) and cast polypropylene (CPP) films, and ultimately to maximize the attachment of active molecules onto them, the optimum treatment parameters of capacitively‐coupled radio‐frequency (13.56 MHz) oxygen plasma were investigated by using contact angle, toluidine blue dye assay, X‐ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS) and Attenuated Total Reflectance Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (ATR‐FTIR). Contact angle values of LDPE and CPP samples decreased significantly after oxygen plasma treatment. They further decreased as the plasma power level increased. The treatment time had no substantial effect on contact angle value. The optimum treatment conditions for LDPE and CPP films for maximizing carboxyl functionality without causing observable surface changes were found to be 200 W/200 mTorr and 250 W/50 mTorr, respectively, when treated for 3 min. The maximum carboxyl group concentration obtained with LDPE and CPP films were 0.46 and 0.56 nmol/cm², respectively. The percent of oxygen atoms on the surface of plasma‐treated LDPE and CPP films was determined by XPS analysis to be 22.6 and 28.7%, respectively. The ATR‐FTIR absorption bands at 1725–1700 cm^?1 confirmed the presence of carboxylic acids on LDPE and CPP films. By exposing the plasma‐treated sample to air rather than water and treating films repeatedly with oxygen plasma, a higher carboxyl group concentration could be obtained. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.