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This thrust area
will develop modeling/simulation tools that support the optimization of
vehicle manufacturing systems. In general, all of the research areas
described in the sections above are at the process level. This thrust area
is intimately connected with the first three, but is focused on model
development at the system level. Attention will be paid to the prediction
and improvement of reliability, productivity and quality, and to the issues
of flexibility and agility in vehicle manufacturing.
Current Project
JOINT OPTIMIZATION OF
INVESTMENT, PRODUCTION, AND MAINTENANCE IN PRODUCTION SYSTEMS
Automotive manufacturing requires decision-making at the strategic,
tactical, and operational level. These decisions include investments,
production targets, production schedules, and maintenance schedules. While
optimizing any one of these decisions is beneficial, a significantly greater
benefit is potentially available from the integrated optimization of the
entire system of decisions.
With steadily dropping vehicle prices and rising incentives, automobile
manufacturers are under intense pressure to cut costs by increasing the
efficiency of manufacturing operations. Simultaneously, however,
flexibility is a priority since customers are demanding a more rapid
introduction of new vehicle models and expecting their custom orders to be
filled ever more quickly. Unfortunately, increasing flexibility generally
decreases efficiency due to added investment and system complexity.
Such tradeoffs are often exacerbated by local optimization of a single
aspect of a production system. For example, flexibility at a line could be
increased through investment in newly flexible manufacturing equipment, but
such equipment is far more expensive and less reliable than traditional
dedicated equipment. Considering several lines together as a coordinated
system, on the other hand, one could achieve significant flexibility with
only minimal investments in moderately flexible equipment.
Similarly, at a more micro-level, efficiency may be increased by closely
coordinating maintenance and production activities. For example, shutting
down production briefly to allow preventive maintenance to be performed
leads to increased reliability and throughput that may far outweigh the
production time foregone. The objectives of this project are to
develop an integrated model of plant investment, production planning,
production scheduling, and maintenance.
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