Flow shop operator scheduling through constraint satisfaction and constraint optimisation techniques

Workers scheduling in not highly automated production lines is an important task, especially when in a production line the number of operators is less than the number of workstations. Finding an optimal distribution plan can increase the line throughput, managing the workforce and the workload in a better way. This work focuses on the operator-scheduling problem for an electromechanical assembly line. Workforce distribution on the workstations has been made with a centralised scheduling based on a mathematical model which, through constraint optimisation principles, is able to find the optimal distribution of workforce optimising fundamental parameters, such as man-hours, throughput, makespan and work in process.