A weighted approach for cellular manufacturing design: Minimizing intercell movement and balancing workload among duplicated machines

A multi-criteria, weighted approach is developed to form machine cells and part families for configuring cellular manufacturing systems. The considered parameters include cycle demand, batch size, pallet size, routeing sequences, processing times, machine capacities, and workload status of machines. In the cell formation process, a weighted criterion is used to measure both part movement between machine cells and workload balance among duplicated machines. An example is used to illustrate computational procedures of the approach and significance of workload balance. Large problems with up to 102 machines and 180 part types are tested and analysed in the computational experiments. Numerical results indicate that the weighted approach is flexible, efficient, and effective for the tested problems. We also compared and analysed cell formation results that are developed by using singular and weighted criteria.