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Robust optimization of resource-constrained assembly line balancing problems with uncertain operation times

Wenrui Jin (School of Mechanical Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, China) (Sino-German College of Applied Science, Tongji University, Shanghai, China)
Zhaoxu He (School of Mechanical Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, China)
Qiong Wu (School of Mechanical Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, China)

Engineering Computations

ISSN: 0264-4401

Article publication date: 20 July 2021

Issue publication date: 4 March 2022

235

Abstract

Purpose

Due to the market trend of low-volume and high-variety, the manufacturing industry is paying close attention to improve the ability to hedge against variability. Therefore, in this paper the assembly line with limited resources is balanced in a robust way that has good performance under all possible scenarios. The proposed model allows decision makers to minimize a posteriori regret of the selected choice and hedge against the high cost caused by variability.

Design/methodology/approach

A generalized resource-constrained assembly line balancing problem (GRCALBP) with an interval data of task times is modeled and the objective is to find an assignment of tasks and resources to the workstations such that the maximum regret among all the possible scenarios is minimized. To properly solve the problem, the regret evaluation, an exact solution method and an enhanced meta-heuristic algorithm, Whale Optimization Algorithm, are proposed and analyzed. A problem-specific coding scheme and search mechanisms are incorporated.

Findings

Theory analysis and computational experiments are conducted to evaluated the proposed methods and their superiority. Satisfactory results show that the constraint generation technique-based exact method can efficiently solve instances of moderate size to optimality, and the performance of WOA is enhanced due to the modified searching strategy.

Originality/value

For the first time a minmax regret model is considered in a resource-constrained assembly line balancing problem. The traditional Whale Optimization Algorithm is modified to overcome the inferior capability and applied in discrete and constrained assembly line balancing problems.

Keywords

Citation

Jin, W., He, Z. and Wu, Q. (2022), "Robust optimization of resource-constrained assembly line balancing problems with uncertain operation times", Engineering Computations, Vol. 39 No. 3, pp. 813-836. https://doi.org/10.1108/EC-01-2021-0061

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2021, Emerald Publishing Limited

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