A Beam Search-based Algorithm for Flexible Manufacturing System Scheduling

A new algorithm is proposed for the flexible manufacturing system (FMS) scheduling problem in this paper. The proposed algorithm is a heuristic based on filtered beam search. It considers the machines and automated guided vehicle (AGV) as the primary resources. It utilizes system constraints and related manufacturing and processing information to generate machines and AGV schedules. The generated schedules can be an entire scheduling horizon as well as various lengths of scheduling periods. The proposed algorithm is also compared with other well-known dispatching rules-based FMS scheduling. The results indicate that the beam search algorithm is a simple, valid and promising algorithm that deserves further research in FMS scheduling field.