Analyzing manufacturing system changes using discrete event simulation

Abstract

This research studied the effects of changing from a traditional manufacturing system to a cell manufacturing system in a value-added wood products company. Discrete event simulation was used to describe the current system and the proposed new systems. Parts were separated into part families that shared similar processing requirements. From analyzing the simulation results of the current system, it was determined that two out of the eleven part families identified were the best candidates to be manufactured in a manufacturing cell. Two cell layouts were simulated, a subcell layout and a single U-cell layout. A separate simulation studied the effect of adding an additional CNC router to the system. The variables analyzed for each part family in the system were work-in-process, lead time, value-added/ non value-added time ratio, and batch sizes. The simulations showed that the single U-cell layout with two workers was the best choice. This option requires one less worker than the other manufacturing cells simulated and costs less than the addition of a third CNC router to implement.