Launching and dispatching strategies for multi-criteria control of closed manufacturing systems with flexible routeing capability

In this paper, the authors study the problems of launching and dispatching of parts in closed manufacturing systems with flexible routeing. For the manufacturing systems being operated against multiple performance criteria, they postulate that controlling different aspects of the operational control strategy to meet one single performance criterion would improve overall system performance. It is suggested that to achieve production rates, launching rules be utilized and to affect flowtime, dispatching rules be manipulated. Also, for measurement of routeing flexibility, an entropic measure of flexibility is refined. The entropy-based rule is then compared with the dispatching rules commonly used in the industry. Control strategies are developed for a test system and it is shown that a hierarchical control strategy works best when multiple performance criteria are of interest.