Combining metaheuristic search and simulation to deal with capacitated aisles in facility layout

Abstract The layout of machines in a manufacturing system has a significant impact on production time and cost. The aim of a good layout is generally determining the machines’ position on the shop floor to minimize transportation time and cost. However, not only machines’ positions but also aisle affect transportation cost and time. The aisles are paths that transporters go through them to move the materials between machines. The capacity of the aisles is limited to a specific number of transporters and this may cause transporters to wait before being allowed to pass an aisle. Therefore, when optimizing the layout of machines, the aisles structure and their capacity must be considered. This article presents a hybrid approach for layout design in manufacturing systems taking into account capacitated aisles structure. The proposed approach combines a metaheuristic algorithm and simulation. First, the aisle structure is defined and then, the layout of the machines is determined. Each layout is evaluated through a simulation model. In this way, it is possible to avoid unrealistic assumptions and consider realistic conditions such as stochastic demand, random process time and random transportation time. Finally, a numerical example is included to illustrate the proposed approach.