Facility Layout Optimization Using Simulation and Genetic Algorithms

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Facility layout optimization using simulation and genetic algorithms

Farhad Azadivar John (Jian) Wang
To cite this Article Wang (Jian) , Farhad Azadivar John(2000) 'Facility layout optimization using simulation and genetic
algorithms', International Journal of Production Research, 38: 17, 4369 — 4383
To link to this Article: DOI: 10.1080/00207540050205154
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INT. J. PROD. RES., 2000, VOL. 38, NO. 17, 4369± 4383
Facility layout optimization using simulation and genetic algorithms
FARHAD AZADIVAR{* and JOHN (JIAN) WANG{
Traditionally, the objective of a facility layout problem has been to minimize the
material handling cost of the manufacturing system. While it is important to
reduce the amount of material handling, the traditional methods do not address
the actual time at which the material is transported. In today’s short cycle time
production environments, the timing of material movement may have a bigger
impact on the productivity of the system than its cost. In this paper, a facility
layout optimization technique is presented that takes into consideration the
dynamic characteristics and operational constraints of the system as a whole,
and is able to solve the facility layout design problem based on a system’s per-
formance measures, such as the cycle time and productivity. Each layout solution
Downloaded By: [Brunel University] At: 20:56 21 July 2010
is presented in the form of a string that is suitable for analysis by a genetic

algorithm technique. These solutions are then translated into simulation models
by a specially designed automated simulation model generator. Genetic
algorithms are used to optimize the layout for manufacturing eŒectiveness
while simulation serves as a system performance evaluation tool. Combined
with a statistical comparison technique to reduce the simulation burden, the
test results demonstrate that the proposed approach overcomes the limitations
of traditional layout optimization methods and is capable of ® nding optimal or
near optimal solutions.
1. Introduction
The facility layout problem in a manufacturing setting is de® ned as the
determination of the relative locations for, and allocation of, the available space
among a given number of workstations. Although most facility layout solutions
have, in the past, focused on minimizing the amount of transportation , the eŒect
of a given layout design on the production function of a manufacturing system is
much more than just the cost of material handling. While material handling cost
remains critical, shorter cycle times have become much more important in today’s
manufacturing systems. In other words, when a certain material is moved is as
important, if not more important, as how much it costs to move it. Rapid develop-
ment of new products, coupled with short delivery times demanded by customers,
are the bases of the time-based competitive strategies rapidly being adopted by
leading ® rms in many industries. Responsive delivery without ine cient excess
inventory and short manufacturing cycle times are the practical considerations
that have strong impacts on the layout design and should be incorporated into the
layout design process as genuine concerns.
{ Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering, Kansas State

University, Manhattan, KA 66506, USA.
{ Talus Solutions Inc., Waterstone, Suite 300, 4751 Best Road, Atlanta, GA 30337-5609,
USA.
* To whom correspondence should be addressed. Present address: College of Engineering,
University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, MA 02747-2300 , USA. e-mail: fazadivar@umassd.edu
International Journal of Production Research ISSN 0020± 7543 print/ISSN 1366± 588X online # 2000 Taylor & Francis Ltd
http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
4370 F. Azadivar and J. Wang
Because of complexity of the manufacturing systems, usually closed-form

analytical expressions for objective functions do not exist. During the past three
decades, a variety of approaches have been proposed to deal with facility layout
optimization problems. In order to come up with analytical objective functions, most
of these approaches limited themselves within the assumption that the volume of
material ¯ ow between workstation pairs is ® xed and resources are always available.
In some cases, there have been a few attempts to take the dynamic characteristics of
systems into considerations as well. Techniques such as dynamic programming
(Rosenblatt 1986), and fuzzy logic theory (Cheng and Gen 1996) have been used
to model such uncertainties.
However, we believe that, in order to account for all the impacts a layout design
has on the performance of a system, a more detailed model of the system needs to be
considered for evaluation of the performance measures. To accomplish this, we use
computer simulation. The problem with computer simulation models is that they do
not yield themselves easily to optimization processes. In this paper, it is proposed to
use an integrated solution procedure that optimizes facility layout designs using
simulation as the means of evaluating the objective function. This provides an addi-
tional ¯ exibility in optimization because, in addition to the usual quantitative vari-
ables, evaluation by simulation allows consideration of qualitative decision variables
that analytical objective functions are not equipped to incorporate.
One of the promising methods of optimizing problems whose performances are
evaluated by a simulation model, especially when qualitative variables are involved,
is the use of Genetic Algorithms (GA). Azadivar and Tompkins (1999) proposed a
simulation model generator with a GA-based optimum seeking algorithm capable of
optimizing simulation models whose performances are functions of qualitative and
structural decision variables of the system. Zhang (1997) extended the technique to
more general ¯ exible manufacturing systems. The work presented here is a method-
ology that is based on this approach for facility layout design where the objective
function is a measure of an actual system performance rather than just the volume of
materials handled.
2. Problem statement
Consider a manufacturing system consisting of m workstations in which n types
of parts, each requiring a set of tasks (operations), are to be processed. A work-
station may consist of a single machine, a cell of several machines, an inspection
centre, a paint booth, etc. The parts require processing on diŒerent subsets of the m
workstations and have diŒerent processing times in each workstation. Each work-
station has its own queuing discipline and breakdown distribution. The system is
either a pull or a push type. In addition, let the area of the shop ¯ oor, the area
required by each workstation, the time delay in each workstation, capacity and speed
of the material handling devices, and the precedence constraints of tasks be given. A
desired design for the system requires an arrangement of these workstations into the
shop ¯ oor such that a certain measure of performance is optimized.
The main assumptions for this problem are as follows.
. The work areas of workstations are rectangular in shape and their orientations
are known.
. Every workstation works only one part at a time.
. Every transporter carries only one type of part at a time.
Facility layout optimization 4371
. The operations are not pre-emptable.

. The operating sequences of tasks are the same for the same part types.
. The objective of the facility layout design is to minimize some measure of the
system performance (e.g. production completion time of the parts produced in
the system, while preserving the stated constraints).
Although the procedure being described in this paper is suitable for all types of
layouts, here we describe the procedure for free layout problems, which are the
most general (and the most di cult) facility layout systems. A free layout is de® ned
as follows.
There is a set of m workstations, denoted by fMig, i ˆ 1; 2; . . . ; m. The area that
each workstation occupies is restricted to be rectangular and is characterized by its
length li, width wi and length and width clearances of cli and cwi, respectively. A
facility layout solution for a given m-workstation plant consists of a bounded
rectangle, R, partitioned by horizontal and vertical line segments into m non-over-
lapping rectangular regions, denoted by fri†, i ˆ 1; 2; . . . ; m. Each region ri, with
width xi and length yi, must be large enough to accommodate one workstation Mi
plus its clearances.
3. Use of genetic algorithm in facility layout design

Genetic Algorithms (GA), proposed by Holland (1975), are heuristic search and
optimization techniques that imitate the natural selection and biological evolution-
ary process. In a GA approach to optimization, feasible solutions to the problem are
encoded in data structures in the form of a string of decision choices that resemble
chromosomes. The algorithm maintains a population of individuals or chromosomes
(solutions) that evolve as chromosomes are created and discarded. Each chromo-
some comprises a number of genes (decision choices), that describe various aspects of
a particular solution. The layout design corresponding to each chromosome is char-
acterized by its ® tness, which is measured by its objective function value. A genera-
tion consisting of surviving individuals of the previous population and new
individuals or oŒspring is generated through reproduction by means of crossover,
mutation, and selection of their parent’s chromosomes.
An eŒective layout of workstations can signi® cantly cut down manufacturing
lead times. Unfortunately, the complexity of this task increases exponentially as
the number of workstations increases. There are n! diŒerent ways of arranging n
workstations into n locations. If all workstations are of equal area, or can be physi-
cally interchanged without altering the overall adjacency or distance relationships
among the remaining workstations, it is easy to specify, in advance, a ® nite number
of potential sites for these workstations to occupy. Given this, the layout problem
can be modelled as a quadratic assignment problem (QAP). If we allow workstations
unequal areas, their respective dimensions and the clearance requirements between
them will determine the distance between two workstations. In such a case, since
distances between locations are not equal and cannot be predetermined, it becomes
extremely di cult even to describe feasible solutions.
During the past three decades, numerous heuristic methods have been developed
to obtain some good, rather than optimal, solutions for layout problems. The pri-
mary di culties associated with these problems are the vast number of possible
physical layouts, and the existence of many relatively poor local optima. For such
a problem, one might expect parallel search methods to perform better than strictly
serial searches, and randomized search methods to perform better than greedy or
enumerative searches. Genetic algorithms combine both of these attributes in a
parallel, stochastic heuristic.
As a powerful and broadly applicable stochastic search and optimization tech-
nique, genetic algorithms have successfully been applied in various areas of industrial
engineering, such as production scheduling and sequencing, reliability design, vehicle
routing and scheduling, group technology, transportation , and many others. The
technique has also been applied to the facility layout problem (Tate and Smith 1995,
Cheng and Gen 1996, Meller and Gau 1996, Tam 1992). However, these published
works are mostly material handling cost driven and do not put enough emphasis on
the performance measures that are time driven and are complex functions of the
layout design (e.g. production rate, cycle time). To evaluate these complex measures,
simulation modelling is often the only feasible method. The approach proposed here,
which combines simulation modelling and a genetic algorithm, provides a unique
opportunity to address this issue.
3.1. String representation of a layout design

Most of the concepts in modelling layout problems for application of genetic
algorithms in this work have been adopted from Cheng and Gen (1996). A brief
description of their approach in representing these problems and using genetic
algorithm operators is presented here.
A free layout type facility design can be represented as a slicing structure. Slicing
is the process of cutting a rectangular region into two smaller rectangular regions by
either a horizontal or a vertical line segment (® gure 1(a)). The line segment is called
the cut-line. The slicing operations are repeated for each newly formed rectangle,
with the slice-line direction chosen to be perpendicular to the previous slice line. A
slicing structure is constructed by recursively partitioning a rectangle R (i.e. the ¯ oor
plan) in such a way that each rectangular partition in the slicing structure cor-
responds to the space allocated to a workstation.
An equivalent representation of a slicing structure is a slicing tree. A slicing tree is
a binary tree, which shows the recursive partitioning process that generates a slicing
1 2
1 2 2 1
2 1
(a) Slicing Structure
* * + +
1 2 2 1 1 2 2 1
(b) Slicing Tree
12* 21* 12+ 21+

(c) Reverse Polish Expression
Figure 1. Slicing structure, slicing tree and reverse Polish expression.
structure. Let the operation of a horizontal cut and a vertical cut be denoted by the
position symbols * and ‡, respectively. Each symbol is explained pictorially in ® gure
1(b). Each internal node represents the way a rectangular partition is cut. Partitions
reserved for workstations reside in the leaves of the tree. Each leaf is assigned a
unique integer corresponding to the identi® er (id) of a workstation. If we recursively
print out the left subtree and the right subtree, then the position symbol of a slicing
tree, a post® x expression called Reverse Polish Expression, is obtained (® gure1(c)).
This representation method yields itself very well to the coding scheme of chro-
mosomes in genetic algorithms. A chromosome will then have m diŒerent work-
station numbers and …m ¡ 1† position symbols where m is the number of
workstations. Slicing structures comprising m given workstations can be represented
by
P slicing trees or Reverse Polish Expressions over the symbol set
ˆ f1; 2; . . . ; m; *; ‡g (Gen and Chen 1997). Figure 2 demonstrates the process
of constructing a layout from its Reverse Polish Expression for a 6-station facility
layout problem.
3.2. Crossover
We employed a special form of crossover operation as suggested by Cheng and
Gen (1996) to preserve the feasibility of solutions. In this operation, an oŒspring
chromosome is generated by adopting workstation numbers from one parent and
position symbols from the other. An example of crossover operation is shown in
® gures 3 and 4. Suppose we have two parents, p1 and p2. The crossover operator
copies the workstation numbers from parents p1 into the corresponding positions in
an oŒspring o. Then it copies position symbols from p2, by scanning from left to
right, to complete the oŒspring o.
3.3. Mutation
Random altering, inverting and swapping are used as a mutation operation
(that is, altering a position symbol to the opposite one (® gure 5), inverting a
sequence of adjacent position symbols or a sequence of adjacent facility numbers
(® gure 6), swapping two adjacent position symbols or two adjacent facility numbers
(® gure 7). Mutation performed in this way can also guarantee to generate legal
oŒspring.
3.4. Selection
The task of selection in the genetic algorithms is to allocate the reproductive
opportunities to each chromosome such that the chromosomes with higher ® tness
value are more likely to survive to the next generation. Selection directs a genetic
algorithm search toward promising regions in the search space. The degree to which
the better chromosomes are favoured is de® ned as the selection pressure. Typically,
higher selection pressure indicates that more of the high ® tness chromosomes are
selected.
Tournament selection (Brindle 1981, Goldberg 1989) is a selection approach with
both random and deterministic sampling features. This method randomly chooses a
set of chromosomes and picks out the one with the highest ® tness value (the winner)
for reproduction. The number of chromosomes in the set is called tournament size.
Usually, tournaments are held between pairs of chromosomes (tournament size ˆ 2),
and the selection process is repeated until a desired size of reproduction set has been
formed. The tournament selection is e cient, simple to code, has no scaling problem,
+
cut-point
+ *
12+345+6**+ 1 2 3 *
+ 6
4 5
+ *
1 2 3 *
345+6**
(12+)
+ 6
4 5
*
3
1 2 + 6
45+6*
4 5
3 +
1 2 45+
4 5
1 2 4 5
Figure 2. Constructing a layout from its reverse Polish expression.
and is capable of adjusting its selection pressure. This selection method has been
employed in this work.
In a facility layout design process based on simulation and genetic algorithm, the
® tness functions are almost always stochastic. The ® tness value of the chromosome,
which is the output of a simulation experiment, could be viewed as one realization of
a random variable whose mean corresponds to the presumed true response. Since the
selection process is based on ® tness values, random ® tness functions cause the selec-
tion process itself to be random as well. However, the precision of the ® tness values
can be improved by replicating the simulation experiment and obtaining a narrower
P1 1 2 * 3 4 5 * 6 + + *
o 1 2 + 3 4 5 * 6 * * +
P2 3 6 1 + 2 5 4 * * * +
Figure 3. Crossover operation.
* +
m2
m1
* + 3 *
m5
m2
1 2 3 + m3 2 *
m4
m4 5
m3 * 6 *
m6 m6 m1
m5 4 +
4 5
(a) Parent 1 p1 6 1
(b) Parent 2 p2
m3 + *
*
1 2 3 *
m1 m2 m4
* 6
m5
4 5
m6
(c) Offspring
Figure 4. Layout after crossover.
con® dence interval. The more replications are performed the better will be the accu-
racy of the solution obtained. Welsh’ s (1938) statistical comparison was employed
for determining the winners of the tournaments.
Since simulation experiments are usually very time consuming, a variable number
of replications per solution are used. This allows us to make fewer replications when
the diŒerence in the ® tness values is relatively large, and to save a larger number of
replications for points where the signal-to-noise ratio is small. The process for using
a variable sample size is as follows.
3 + *
1 2 4 5 1 2 3 *
6 + 6
4 5
Parent p1 (12+345+6**+ )
1 2 + 3 4 5 + 6 * * +
1 2 * 3 4 5 + 6 * * +
(a) Altering operation
3 * *
1
4 5 1 2 3 *
2 6
+ 6
4 5
(b) Offspring o1 after altering
Figure 5. Altering operation.
1 2 + 3 4 5 + 6 * * +
1 2 + 5 4 3 + 6 * * +
(a) Inverting operation
5 + *
1 2 4 3 1 2 5 *
6 + 6
4 3
(b) Offspring o2 after inverting
Figure 6. Inverting operation.

1 2 + 3 4 5 + 6 * * +
1 2 + 3 4 5 + 6 * + *
(a) Swapping operation
1 2 + +
4 5 1 2 3 *
3
6 + 6
4 5
(b) Offspring o3 after swapping
Figure 7. Swapping operation.
. The ® tness values of two chromosomes are ® rst compared based on ® ve repli-
cations of their corresponding simulation models. A test of signi® cance is
performed to make sure the diŒerence between ® tness values is signi® cant. If
so, the chromosome with the inferior ® tness value is considered the loser and
does not move on to the next generation.
. If the diŒerence is not signi® cant, one more replication is made for each
chromosome and the comparison is repeated. This process continues until
either the diŒerence becomes signi® cant (as a result of a reduction in the con-
® dence interval due to the larger number of replications) or a limit of 20
replications per point is reached.
3.5. System ¯ owchart

The general ¯ owchart of the algorithm is given in ® gure 8. In the algorithm,
simulation is considered as a function evaluator, and its output is regarded as the
® tness of the chromosome. The algorithm starts with an initial set of random
solutions generated by the optimization module. A new generation is formed by
selecting parent chromosomes from the current generation and modifying them
with crossover and mutation operators. Then, chromosomes in the new genera-
tion are evaluated by simulation, their representation strings and ® tness are stored
in a standard data structure called a hashing table, which is very e cient in
searching for identical elements. In each evaluation process, the hashing table is
® rst probed to ® nd out if the same chromosome has been tested in previous
generations; if not, a simulation experiment is run to get the ® tness value.
Otherwise, the ® tness value found in the ® tness hashing table is simply assigned
to the chromosome. A similar approach has been employed by Zhang (1997) and
has shown a signi® cant reduction in simulation runs resulting in savings of up to
45% ¹ 70% of expensive CPU time. Such bene® ts have been also observed in this
implementation.
start
initial
comparing
population
chromosomes
no add one more

selection significant? replication
yes
update fitness
crossover table
search in
mutation
fitness table
yes
find? get fitness evaluation
no
no
run simulation
converged ?
yes
end
Figure 8. Computation ¯ owchart of the algorithm.
4. System architecture
The system consists of a GA package, a simulation package, an automatic
simulation model generator, and a graphical user interface. The graphical user inter-
face is used to input the information on workstations and parts, dimensional
constraints of the shop ¯ oor and GA parameters. The simulation is considered a
function evaluator (objective function). The genetic algorithm systematically
searches and generates alternative layout designs according to the decision criterion
speci® ed by the user. The simulation model generator then creates and executes
simulation models recommended by the GA and returns the results to the GA.
This iteration between the generator and GA continues until all the chromosomes
in the generation converge to one structure, or the limit on the number of genera-
tions to consider (set according to the available time and resources) is reached.
5. Numerical example
The test problem is described as follows: A manufacturing system consists of
eight workstations, and two lift trucks. Four diŒerent types of parts come into the
system randomly with an inter-arrival time following a certain distribution. The
parts require processing on diŒerent subsets of eight workstations and have diŒerent
distributions of processing times on each operation. Lift trucks are used to move
parts from one workstation to another according to the pre-de® ned processing
sequences for each part type. The area requirements of each workstation are given
in table 1. Tables 2, 3 and 4 provide more information about the manufacturing
system. The shop ¯ oor is a 90 £ 90 (m) square area. The objective is to ® nd a free
layout design for the system to result in an overall shorter average cycle time for all
Workstation Length Width Clearance Clearance Total area

identi® cation (X-axis) (Y-axis) in X-direction in Y-direction required
1 9 17 1 3 10 £ 20
2 18 18 2 2 20 £ 20
3 26 16 4 4 30 £ 20
4 32 9 8 1 40 £ 10
5 45 28 5 2 50 £ 30
6 16 8 4 2 20 £ 10
7 36 17 4 3 40 £ 20
8 16 9 4 1 20 £ 10
Table 1. Geometric constraints on workstations.
Speed
Number (m/min) Policy Capacity
2 10.0 FCFS 1
Table 2. Transporter information.
Part Inter-arrival Batch Maximum Start Total number

identi® cation distribution (min) size batch time of processes
1 EXPONENTIAL(12) 1 100 0 4
3 CONSTANT(8) 1 100 0 3
Table 3. Parts information.
Part Part Routing Processing time

identi® cation name sequences distribution
1 Part 1 Machine 1 NORM(1,0.5)

Machine 4 NORM(1,0.2)
Machine 7 NORM(6,1)
Machine 1 CONSTANT(1)
Machine 3 NORM(0.5,0.1)
Machine 4 NORM(1.5,0.5)
Machine 8 NORM(4,1)
4 Part 4 Machine 5 CONSTANT(1)
Table 4. Routing information.

parts. The evolutionary environment for this GA experiment is given as follows. The
population size is 30, the crossover rate is 0.60, the mutation rate is 0.008, and the
maximum number of generations allowed is 50. A typical solution (the best chromo-
some obtained from one pass of the genetic algorithm) is shown as follows:
2; 1; *; 3; *; 7; 6; *; 4; *; 8; ¤; 5; *; ‡
which has an average cycle time of 940.88 minutes.

This best layout is depicted in ® gure 9. The evolutionary process is shown in
® gure 10.
m5
m3
m8
Width 90
m4 80
m1
m6
m2 m7
80
Length 90
Figure 9. The llayout of the Example
Evolutionary Process
1800
1600
1400
1200
cycle time
1000 average
cycle time
800
minimum
600 cycle time
400
200
0
1
11
16
21
26
31
36
41
46
gener at io n
Figure 10. Evolutionary process of GA in obtaining the optimum layout.

From the evolutionary process, we can see that before the 11th generation, the
solution with the minimum cycle time still has a cycle time greater than the ® nal
minimum and the whole generation has an average cycle time of above 1200 minutes.
The worst cycle time found during this period has an average cycle time of 2101.53
minutes. Under pressure of selection, chromosomes evolve gradually while under the
guidance of genetic algorithm the solutions in the search process move slowly to
some promising regions. The average cycle time improves from the initial value of
1665.81 to 948.67 in the 20th generation. The solutions in the set converge gradually
and, after the 25th generation, the variation among the chromosomes in the set
diminishes and all the solutions converge to only one alternative. As shown in the
history of the best ® tness values, the best chromosome is found in the 21st genera-
tion, with an average cycle time of 940.88, which is less than half of the average cycle
time that resulted from the worst system.
6. Comparison of proposed and traditional methods

As mentioned earlier, in traditional facility layouts, material handling cost is the
major concern of the layout design. EŒort is spent to reduce unnecessary part move-
ments between workstations. In today’ s rapidly changing global market, while
material handling cost remains critical, the development of new products and
quick customer delivery are playing a key role when competing with other factors.
Responsive delivery without ine cient excess inventory, short manufacturin g cycle
time, and other practical considerations have strong impacts on the layout design
and should be incorporated into the layout design process. Since traditional methods
only consider the volume of materials handled, changing other factors such as the
number of transporters or processing time on various machines does not aŒect the
solution. If the optimum layout does indeed change with the change in these par-
ameters, it will be an indication of the need for considering the actual performance of
interest rather than just the volume of material handling. To assess this, experiments
were conducted to investigate the eŒects of varying factors, such as the number of
material handling units and machines’ capacities, and the changes in the results were
observed.
A stable manufacturing system with eight workstations is chosen as a base model,
in which each workstation has a medium level work loading (utilization between
30% ± 70% ). In the ® rst experiment, the eŒect of machine performance on layout
design was studied. The processing speed of a machine was changed while keeping all
other factors the same. In the second set of experiments, the eŒect of the number of
material handling resources on the layout design was investigated by varying the
number of available lift trucks with all other settings of the manufacturing system
kept unchanged.
To examine the eŒect of machines’ capacities, two slightly diŒerent manufactur-
ing systems were chosen and the objective of the optimization process was set as a
minimization of the average cycle time. Basically, the two models are the same except
that the processing speed of one of the machines in system 1 is lower than a similar
machine in system 2. All the other parameter settings (number of simulation runs,
population size, maximum generation, etc) were kept the same for both systems. The
experiment showed that the results are diŒerent for these two systems. Figure 11(a)
shows this evolutionary process. Obviously, with traditional methods the answer
provided for both systems would have been the same.
2000
1800
Average Cycle Time of the Population

1600
1400
1200
Two Transporters
1000
2000
Average Cycle Time
System 1 800
1500
600
1000
Syste 2 400
500 Three Transporters
200
0
0
1 11 21 31 41
1 11 21 31 41
Number of Generations Number of Generations
(a) (b)
Figure 11. The eŒect of change in system parameters on the optimum layout.
Similar tests were conducted with material handling resources. This time the
manufacturing system was tested with diŒerent numbers of material handling
resources. In the two test cases, the number of transporters was varied while all
other parameters were kept the same. The test results showed that, again the
optimum layout changed with this change. The evolutionary process for this test
is shown in ® gure 11(b).
7. Conclusions
This paper presented an approach for solving facility layout optimization
problems for manufacturing systems with dynamic characteristics and qualitative
and structural decision variables. The proposed approach integrates genetic algor-
ithms, computer simulation and an automated simulation model generator with a
user-friendly interface. Since GA is capable of solving the combinatorial optimiza-
tion problems, and the simulation is capable of modelling and evaluating the per-
formance of complex systems, this combination enables us to optimize e ciently the
facility layout design of such systems. The proposed method considers the opera-
tional policies, resources and time requirements of all aspects of the process to
overcome the limitations of traditional layout optimization methods.
Although this method cannot guarantee an optimum solution, empirical tests indi-
cate it is able to make considerable improvements in the value of the objective
function.
Additional work in this area can improve the performance of the process. In
particular, to preserve the feasibility of a solution, the search proposed in this work
uses a particular crossover strategy that allows only the position symbols to trade
places. Other techniques can be investigated to take full advantage of all crossover
methods that can still preserve feasibility. Furthermore, other methods of mutation
can also be investigated.
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Facility Layout Optimization Using Simulation and Genetic Algorithms

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On: 21 July 2010

International Journal of Production Research

Facility layout optimization using simulation and genetic algorithms

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Facility layout optimization using simulation and genetic algorithms

FARHAD AZADIVAR{* and JOHN (JIAN) WANG{

is presented in the form of a string that is suitable for analysis by a genetic

{ Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering, Kansas State

Because of complexity of the manufacturing systems, usually closed-form

. The operations are not pre-emptable.

3. Use of genetic algorithm in facility layout design

3.1. String representation of a layout design

12* 21* 12+ 21+

Figure 2. Constructing a layout from its reverse Polish expression.

Figure 3. Crossover operation.

Figure 4. Layout after crossover.

(b) Offspring o2 after inverting

Figure 6. Inverting operation.

Figure 7. Swapping operation.

3.5. System ¯ owchart

no add one more

Figure 8. Computation ¯ owchart of the algorithm.

Workstation Length Width Clearance Clearance Total area

Table 1. Geometric constraints on workstations.

Table 2. Transporter information.

Part Inter-arrival Batch Maximum Start Total number

Table 3. Parts information.

Part Part Routing Processing time

1 Part 1 Machine 1 NORM(1,0.5)

Table 4. Routing information.

which has an average cycle time of 940.88 minutes.

Figure 9. The llayout of the Example

Figure 10. Evolutionary process of GA in obtaining the optimum layout.

6. Comparison of proposed and traditional methods

Average Cycle Time of the Population

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