Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 39:943953 DOI 10.

1007/s00170-007-1274-7

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

A flow matrix-based heuristic algorithm for cell formation and layout design in cellular manufacturing system
Iraj Mahdavi & Babak Shirazi & Mohammad Mahdi Paydar

Received: 18 March 2007 / Accepted: 9 October 2007 / Published online: 7 December 2007 # Springer-Verlag London Limited 2007

Abstract Cellular manufacturing is a successful application of group technology (GT) concepts. The aim of a cellular manufacturing system (CMS) is to identify similar manufacturing processes and features where machines are grouped into machine cells based on their contributions to the production process. In the last three decades of research in cell formation, researchers have mainly used zero-one machine component incidence matrix as the input data for the problem. However, recently efforts have been made to use other data structures, such as interval data and ordinal data (consisting of sequence of processing). Sequence data provide valuable information about the flow patterns of various jobs in a manufacturing system. This study develops a heuristic algorithm based on flow matrix for cell formation and layout design in a simultaneous fashion using sequence data. The numerical results of the algorithm on the available problems in the literature indicate the usefulness of the algorithm regarding to performance indices. Keywords Cell formation . Layout design . Flow matrix . Sequence data

1 Introduction Group technology is a manufacturing philosophy in which similar parts are identified and grouped together to take
I. Mahdavi (*) : B. Shirazi : M. M. Paydar Department of Industrial Engineering, Mazandaran University of Science & Technology, P.O. Box 734, Babol, Iran e-mail: irajarash@rediffmail.com

advantages of their similarities in manufacturing and design. GT was first proposed by [25], and was propagated by [3], who developed methods suitable for hand computation. Cellular manufacturing is a successful application of GT concepts. One of the first problems encountered in implementation of a cellular manufacturing is that of cell formation. In the past several years, many solution methods have been developed to cell formation problem. Generally these methods can be classified as machine cell formation by a binary machine-part incidence matrix and cell formation by a sequence data. Much research based on binary data has been proposed to address the cell formation problems, such as hierarchical methods by [24, 27, 31, 34]. Most of the hierarchical methods compute and use similarity coefficients for the purpose of forming the clusters. On the other hand, non-hierarchical methods start with an initial clustering of the machines, and use this as an initial solution for the formation part families. Algorithms that use non-hierarchical methods can be found in [6, 30]. Other approaches for the problem include production flow analysis by [4, 5], methods based on mathematical programming [19, 23, 29, 33], cluster identification algorithm [20] and Genetic algorithms [10, 15]. Use of sequence data for cell formation problem provides additional information to the cell designer. Sequence data identify the order in which jobs get processed in a manufacturing setup. Therefore, this information can be used not only for identifying part families and machine groups, but also to arrive at the layout of machines within each cell based on dominant flow patterns within each cell. The problem of identifying families of parts that have approximately the same processing sequences was first addressed by [28]. They presented a heuristic procedure on set covering technique to identify cells. Gupta and Seifoddini [11] proposed a

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similarity coefficient incorporating operation sequence, production volume and operation time simultaneously. From the definition, each part that is processed by at least one machine from a pair of machines contributes towards their similarity coefficient value. A part that is processed by both machines increases the coefficient value for the two machines whereas a part that is processed on one machine tends to reduce it. Choobineh [8] and Tam [32] proposed new similarity coefficients using sequence data for cell formation. Using Tams similarity coefficient, Kiang et al. [17] developed a neural network-based algorithm to identify machine cells. Many solution methods, such as mathematical programming [9, 16], heuristics, optimization procedures and clustering techniques have been proposed to address the cell formation problems using sequence data. Boulif and Atif [2] addressed a branch-and-bound-enhanced genetic algorithm for cell formation problem using a graph partitioning formulation of this problem. They considered some of the natural data inputs and constraints encountered in real-life production systems, such as operation sequence, maximum number of cells, maximum cell size, and machine cohabitation and non-cohabitation. Heragu and Kakuturi [13] attempted to integrate machine grouping and layout problems. The machine cells are first formed by a heuristic and near-optimal intra-cell and inter-cell layouts are constructed by a hybrid simulated annealing algorithm. Lee and Chiang [22] considered the joint clustering-layout problem where machine cells are to be located along the bi-directional linear flow layout. They seek to minimize the actual inter-cell flow cost, instead of the typical measure that minimizes the number of inter-cell movements. Chiang and Lee [7] developed a genetic-based algorithm with the optimal partition approach for the cell formation in bi-directional linear flow layout, where the objective is to minimize the actual intercell flow cost, instead of the typical measure that optimizes the number of inter-cell movements. On the other hand, the layout problem has been long addressed by researcher (see [12, 21]). Houshyar and McGinnis [14] applied a graphic approach to assign the facilities in a layout, where the travel distance of work in process is to be minimized. Among other works, Afentakis [1] addressed the unidirectional uni-cyclic manufacturing layout problems. There are some more recent works regarding the use of sequence data to address the cell formation problem, for example the research by [18, 3537]. In this paper, the cell formation and layout design are considered simultaneously. We propose a new heuristic algorithm based on flow matrix that utilizes the sequence data as input to the problem and identifies machine cells and the layout of machines within each cell. The objective is to make use of the valuable information about the flow patterns of

various jobs in a manufacturing system and obtain relevant performance measures for the cell design and layout problem. The approach is illustrated by two examples and a comparison has been done with CASE algorithm by Nair and Narendran [26] and genetic algorithm by Boulif and Atif [2].

2 Performance index for the cell formation and layout design The existence of voids and exceptions (inter-cell movements) are typical of CMS design and cell designers endeavor to minimize them. On the other hand, in the case of layout design the focus is more on intra-cell movements. Layout design emphasizes the need for adjacency of processes as it can reduce material handling costs. From a production planning and control perspective, reverse movements within a cell and skipping of workstations are undesirable, as they tend to increase the complexity of planning and control. Three measures of performance for evaluating the goodness of the solution are defined. The proposed measure addresses all these requirements. The following notations are with respect to the CMS cell and layout design problem and develop relevant performance measures:

Notations
i j k S=[Sij] Sij index for parts (i =1, 2,..., P) index for machines ( j=1,2..., M) index for cells (k =1, 2,..., C) represent the machine-part incidence matrix using sequence data is the sequence of ith part in jth machine = 0 if the part does not require the machine > 0, and an ordinal number indicating the position in the overall sequence Number of parts in cell k Number of machines in cell k Number of forward movements within cell k Number of operations in cell k Total number of movements within a cell k

Pk Mk Nfk Nopk Ntk

The total number of operations to be performed, the total number of movements and the size of cell k are as follows: Total number of operations; Nops
P X i1

max sij
j

Therefore; total number of movements; Ntmov Nops P 2

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The size of cell k; Nsk Pk *Mk 2.1 Cell movement index (CMI)

The cell movement index for cell k, CMIk is defined as the ratio of the number of forward movement to the total number of movements within a cell. Average cell movement index (ACMI) is the weighted average of CMIK by the number of parts in the cells. The expressions for CMI and ACMI are given below:
CMIk Number of forward movements within the cell k Nfk Number of movements within the cell k Ntk

4
C P

Average Cell Movement Index; ACMI

k1

Pk *CMIk P 5

2.2 Cell utilization index (CUI) The cell utilization index for each cell (CUIk) is defined as the ratio of the number of operation in cell k to the size of cell k. Average cell utilization index (ACUI) is defined by Eq. (7). CUIk Nopk Number of operation in cell k The size of cell k Nsk 6

is higher. Therefore, CMI indicates the quality of the solution with respect to the intra-cell movements. The cell utilization is defined efficiency of each cell. Therefore, the more cell utilization, the less the number of voids in each cell. On the other hand, OMI indicates the extent of intercell movement required by the parts to complete processing. This is obvious because Ntmov is the summation of the total number of movements within cell (Ntk) and exceptions (inter-cell moves). Since Ntk and inter-cell moves are complementary to each other, for a given value of the number of forward movements (Nfk), a higher value of OMI can be achieved only by having fewer inter-cell movements. It is clear from the above that while CMI addresses the issue of intra-cell, OMI focuses on inter-cell issues. By assessing the solution on the basis of forward movements, we take care of the layout design and adjacency requirements. Furthermore, the definitions and the above discussions for the measures show that the three measures together address the traditional requirements of minimization of exceptions and voids for a CMS design. In this manner, a quantitative measure for assessing both the layout and the CMS designs of the proposed algorithm is provided. 2.4 Flow matrix Since forward movement is a good indicator of the goodness of the solution, a flow matrix on the basis of the number of forward movement between a pair of machines and use it as the basic input to the grouping and layout problem are developed. The flow matrix is as follows: Let us consider a pair of machines, machine j and machine j. If a part i visits machine j and machine j in immediate succession, then there is one unit of forward movement between the pair machines. Therefore, by assessing the nature movement of all the parts visiting a pair of machines, one can estimate the number of forward movement between the pair of machines in the production system. This measure as the movement coefficient fjj0 between machines j and j is defined. The expression for fjj0 is obtained as follows: Xijj0 is the unit movement coefficient for a part i between machines j and j as follows: xijj0 xijj0 xijj0 xijj0 0 if Sij 0 0 if Sij0 0 1 if Sij0 Sij1 0 otherwise P P fjj0 Xijj0
i1

C P

Average Cell Utilization Index; ACUI

k1

CUIk C 7

2.3 Overall movement index (OMI) Another measure of interest is the overall movement index (OMI). OMI is defined as the ratio of the number of forward movements in all the cells to the total number of movements required to process all the parts in the system.
C P

OMI

Sum of forward movements in all the cell k1 Total number of movements in the system Ntmov 8

Nfk

From an examination of the CMI measure, a high value of CMI is possible when the number of forward movements

By a pair-wise comparison of all the machines in the system in this fashion, one can arrive at the flow matrix F fjj0 . The flow matrix F is an MM asymmetric matrix.

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Start Read matrix Sij

k: =0

Create flow matrix Take highest entry of matrix as threshold value

Create a new cell k: =k+1 Select threshold entry in matrix at location (

j , j ) for cell k

Assign machines j and j in cell k

Check from j th row for assigning new machine in cell k Consider machine j as machine j in cell k and eliminate machine j for next consideration There is at location ( j , j ) : assign machine j after machine j in cell k

for cell=1 to k

Yes

Is there any threshold value? No

Check in j th column for assigning new machine

Consider machine j as machine j in cell k and eliminate machine j for next consideration

There is at location ( j , j ) : assign machine j before machine j in cell k

Yes

Is there any threshold value? No

Select next upper value as a threshold value Yes

Whether all the machines exhausted?

No

Whether threshold value exhausted?

Yes Stop
Fig. 1 The flowchart of proposed algorithm

No

3 Cell formation and layout design algorithm The proposed algorithm aims at simultaneously providing solutions pertaining to the number of cells and their respective

membership of parts and machines as well as the layout (sequence) of machines in each cell. This is a construction algorithm that identifies the maximum value of fjj0 for selecting the next machine to include in the cells. The algorithm begins

Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 39:943953 Table 1 [26]-820 machines-parts matrix Parts 1 Machines 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 2 1 2 5 2 1 3 4 3 4 2 2 1 2 5 3 4 2 2 3 1 3 2 1 4 5 6 7 8 1 1 1 4 2 3 2 3 1 1 2 1 3 2 2 9 1 10 11 3 12 13 1 14 1 2 3 1 2 15 16 1 2 17 3 2 1 1 2 4 3 2 18 19 1

947

20

2 1 3 4 5

by selecting a pair of machines that can be placed side by side on account of high value of fjj0 . After the machine pair is identified, partial solution is examined to find if one of them is already part of the partial solution. In such a situation, the improved solution is obtained by inserting the other machine into that cell appropriately. If the pair is not found in any of the cells already obtained a new cell is formed. The procedure stops when all the machines are assigned to the cells. The corresponding part families are identified. The final solution is not only the group membership of the machines in each cell, but also the order in which the machines have to be placed to maximize forward movements. The algorithm includes the following steps: Step Step Step Step Read matrix Sij. Construct flow matrix with the help of matrix Sij. Create a new cell. Take highest nonzero entry in the flow matrix formed in step 2 as threshold value. Step 5 Select threshold entry in the flow matrix at location (j, j). In case of tie select any one of them arbitrarily. Then assign jth machine and jth machine in current cell. 1 2 3 4

Step 6 Check from jth(jth) machine, whether the same threshold value exists in the jth row (jth column). If it exists in location (j, j) (location (j, j)), then assign jth machine (jth machine) to current cell after jth machine (before jth machine). Now jth machine (jth machine) is removed for next consideration and check in the jth row (jth column) whether current threshold value exists. If it exists, continue in the same manner. Step 7 If all the machines have been assigned, go to step 15. Step 8 If all threshold values have been exhausted go to step 10. Step 9 Create a new cell and go to step 5. Step 10 Consider next upper value in the flow matrix as threshold value. Step 11 Choose one location which lies in row (column) corresponding to the last machine (to the machine first) of formed cell. Continue the process of step 6. Step 12 If all the machines have been assigned, go to step 15.

Table 2 CASE solution

2 M A C H I N E S 3 1 4 7 8 2 5 6 2 1

8 2 1

9 3 1

1 1 2 3 1

1 3 2 1

1 4 3 1

1 6 2 1

1 7 1 3

1 9 2 1

PARTS 3 4 6

1 8

2 0

1 0

1 2

1 5

2 2 2

2 5 3 4 1

2 3 4 1

2 3 4 1 5

2 3 1 4

1 4 3 2

1 4 5 2 3 2 1 2 1

2 2

3 1

1 3

2 0

948 Table 3 Flow matrix for example1 Machines M1 Machines M1 M2 M3 M4 M5 M6 M7 M8 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 M2 1 0 0 2 0 0 1 0 M3 5 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 M4 0 2 0 0 0 1 0 2 M5 0 0 1 2 0 2 0 1 M6 1 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 M7 1 0 0 3 1 1 0 1 M8 0 1 0 0 0 0 4 0

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Step 13 If all threshold values have been exhausted go to step 10. Step 14 Create a new cell and go to step 5. Step 15 Create part family, assign a part to a cell, where it requires maximum number of machines for its operations, if ties exist, resolve the ties by assigning the part to the cell where the better CUI has been obtained. For more understanding, the flowchart of algorithm is shown in Fig. 1.

Moreover, Table 3 has shown the flow matrix for the eight machines and with this data the application of proposed algorithm is demonstrated. Based on flow matrix, the highest nonzero entry (threshold value) is 5 in the (1, 3) location. Assign M1 and M3 in first cell. Next upper threshold value 4 exists in (7, 8) location. Assign M7 and M8 in the second cell. For threshold value i.e., 3 put M4 before M7 in cell II. To assign other machine has to check next upper threshold i.e., 2 value. There are five threshold values with two numbers. According to step 11 for machine M4, threshold value 2 is located at (2, 4) and there is not threshold value 2 associated with M8. Therefore assign M2 before M4 in cell II. Now check for the remaining current threshold value 2 in the above matrix. It is located at only one position which is (6, 5). Assign machines M6 and M5 in cell III. On the basis of above created cells and step 15, the part family in the form of parts-machines matrix is given in Table 4. 4.2 Example 2 We solve the other problem from the literature [26] as shown in Table 5. It shows the sequence data pertaining to the problem consisting of 25 machines and 40 parts. The flow matrix for this example has been given in Table 6. According to the flow matrix and algorithm steps, the solution of example II is as follows: The highest nonzero entry threshold value is 3, associated with (8, 10), (18, 7) and (21, 6) position. So assign M8 and M10 in first cell, M18 and M7 in second cell and M21 and M6 in third cell. All the current threshold values have been exhausted. Following cells have been formed so far. Cell I M8, M10 Cell II M18, M7 Cell III M21, M6

4 Numerical illustration To validate and verify the proposed algorithm, two test problems from the literature have been solved. 4.1 Example 1 Table 1 shows the sequence data pertaining to the problem consisting of 8 machines and 20 parts considered by Nair and Narendran [26], where the result of CASE algorithm has been given in Table 2.
Table 4 The solution of proposed algorithm

2 M A C H I N E S 1 3 2 4 7 8 6 5 1 2

8 1 2

9 1 3

1 1 3 2

1 3 1 2

1 4 1 3 2

1 6 1 2

1 7 3 1

1 9 1 2

PARTS 3 4 6 2 1 5 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 5

1 8

2 0

1 0

1 2

1 5

1 2 2

4 2 3 1

2 1 4 3

2 1 4 5 3

2 2 1 2 1 2 1 3 3 1

0 2

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Table 5 [26]-2540 machines-parts matrix Machines 1 Parts 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 2 3 4 5 2 3 2 3 3 1 3 2 2 1 4 3 4 4 1 1 3 3 1 3 3 1 1 1 4 2 1 1 2 2 3 4 2 2 1 2 2 2 3 3 2 2 2 3 1 3 1 4 2 1 4 1 1 1 3 1 3 3 1 3 2 2 3 1 1 3 4 2 1 3 1 3 1 3 4 3 3 2 2 2 5 3 3 2 2 2 1 3 2 1 2 1 3 2 3 1 2 1 2 2 4 2 1 1 3 1 2 5 4 2 5 3 1 2 3 1 2 4 3 1 1 2 1 2 3 5 6 7 3 8 9 10 1 11 12 13 14 15 16 4 4 1 2 17 18 2 19 20 21 22 6 1 23 24 25

Select next upper threshold value i.e., 2. According to threshold value 2, assign M9 after M10 in first cell, M16 and M4 in second cell and create a new cell with M1 and M2 and also new cells one for M3 and M11 and assign M20 before M3, one for M5 and M19, one for M22 and M15 and also one for M23 and M12. All current threshold values have been exhausted now. Choose next upper value as threshold value, i.e., the value 1. With current threshold value 1 and on the

basis of algorithm, assign M17 after M2 and M25 before M1 in cell IV, M14 and M13 after M15 in cell VII and M24 after M12 in cell VIII. Get the following final shape of the formed cells. Cell Cell Cell Cell I M8, M10, M9 II M18, M7, M16, M4 III M21, M6 IV M25, M1, M2, M17

950 Table 6 Flow matrix for example 2 Machines 1 Machines 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 2 2 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 1 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 1 0 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 8 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 9 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 10 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 11 0 1 2 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 12 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 13 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 14 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 15 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 2 0 0 0 16 0 0 0 2 2 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 2 0 0

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17 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0

18 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

19 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

20 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1

21 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0

22 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

23 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

24 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

25 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0

Table 7 CASE solution

1 8 3 0 2 1 3 2 1 2 3 4 1 5 7 1 6 1 7 3 0 8 1 5 2 3 2 4 3 1 3 9 1 3 1 4 3 3 1 1 3 3 2 2 5 3 4 1 3 0 0 1 3 2 4 4 1 3 2 2 0 1 0 1 4 2 3 2 1 4 3 3 4 1 2 3 1 2 3 3 1 2 2 0 1 2 3 2 1 2 3 0 1 3 4 2 1 3 2 0 1 3 4 2 0 3 3 0 1 2 1 0 2 4 1 3 2 1 5 2 1 3 0 1 1 2 1 2 1 2 2 1 1 3 1 0 1 3 1 2 1 2 0 1 2 3 4 0 1 0 3 2 2 3 1 0 1 2 0 3 1 2 3 1 2 4 4 1 5 3 3 2 2 2 5 2 7 2 9 3 5 4 0 4 6 2 0 2 6 3 4 3 7 3 9 2 1 2 3 6 1 0 1 9 2 1 2 2 2 8 3 8

14 13 15 22 18 4 7 16 19 5 20 3 11 25 21 6 23 12 1 2 17 24 9 8 10

1 2 4 0 1 2 3 3 2 0

Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 39:943953 Table 8 The solution of proposed algorithm for example 2
1 0 2 0 1 1 9 1 2 3 2 1 1 2 3 2 2 4 0 2 2 8 2 3 1 3 8 2 0 3 1 5 7 1 6 1 7 3 0 1 1 2 2 5 2 7 2 9 3 5 4 0 2 1 2 3 6 3 9 1 3 1 4 3 3 8 1 5 5 1 0 0 3 1 2 4 3 4 3 2 1 2 1 0 0 1 2 3 4 1 0 3 2 1 3 0 1 2 1 2 1 2 1 2 3 4 5 1 0 3 4 4 3 1 3 3 2 1 2 2 3 4 0 2 3 1 1 2 3 2 2 4 1 1 3 4 1 3 2 3 4 2 1 3 0 1 1 2 3 2 2 1 1 0 2 3 1 2 3 0 4 3 1 2 2 1 0 1 3 0 1 0 0 4 2 3 2 4 3 1 1 8 3 2 4 6 2 0 2 6 3 4 3 7

951

3 9

8 10 9 18 7 16 4 21 6 25 1 2 17 20 3 11 5 19 22 15 14 13 23 12 24

1 2 3 4 5

3 1 3 2 2 2 2

1 3

1 3 0

1 2 3

1 2 0

0 1 0

Cell Cell Cell Cell

V M20, M3, M11 VI M5, M19 VII M22, M15, M14, M13 VIII M23, M12, M24

Moreover, Tables 7 and 8 include obtained results of 2540 machine-part matrix to CASE and proposed algorithms.

5 Discussion The machine groups obtained by the proposed algorithm in example 1 are the same as those obtained by CASE algorithm. We also notice that the solution is the same as that we obtained by rearranging the machines while improving CASE solution. Table 9 shows the details of

the comparative study with CASE method and genetic algorithm for the example 1. While the machine groups, part families and cell utilization are identical in both the CASE and proposed solution, the ACMI and OMI have varied markedly. In the case of proposed algorithm, the arrangement of machines in the right order has ensured that the CMIk for all the three cells are much higher compared to the CASE solution. This has resulted in much higher values for both ACMI and OMI, indicating a more appropriate solution for the combined cell formation and layout problem. As it is stated before, in this paper the cell formation and layout design are considered simultaneously. But in genetic algorithm, they consider only the cell formation which is a weak point in CMS design. Boulif and Atif [2] compared genetic algorithm with other algorithms based on inter-cell

Table 9 Performance measure comparison between CASE, genetic algorithm and proposed algorithm CASE Cell No 1 2 3 ACMI (%) ACUI (%) OMI (%) Pk Nfk Ntk 6 16 2 CMI (%) 16.7% 43.8% 0 Genetic algorithm Pk 14 6 76.0% Nfk 7 9 Ntk 12 16 CMI (%) 58.3% 56.3% Proposed algorithm Pk Nfk Ntk 6 16 2 CMI (%) 83.3% 56.3% 100%

9 1 6 7 5 0 18.4% 96.7 % 22.0%

9 5 6 9 5 2 79.4 % 96.7 % 39.0%

952 Table 10 2540 matrixComparison of CASE, genetic and proposed solutions CASE Cell No 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 ACMI (%) ACUI (%) OMI (%) Machines in the cell 14, 13, 15, 22 18, 4, 7, 16 19, 5 20, 3, 11, 25 21, 6 23, 12 1, 2, 17, 24 9, 8, 10 62% 83.5% 36.3% Parts in the cell Genetic algorithm Machines in the cell 1, 2, 17 3, 11, 20, 25 4, 7, 16, 18 5, 19, 13, 14 6, 15, 21, 22 8, 9, 10 12, 23, 24 71.8% Parts in the cell

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Proposed algorithm Machines in the cell 8, 10, 9 18, 7, 16, 4 21, 6 25, 1, 2, 17 20, 3, 11 5, 19 22, 15, 14, 13 23, 12, 24 69% 83.2% 37.4% Parts in the cell

18, 32 1, 5, 7, 16, 17, 30 8, 15, 23, 24, 31 3, 9, 13, 14, 33 11, 25, 27, 29, 35, 40 4, 6, 20, 26, 34, 37, 39 2, 12, 36 10, 19, 21, 22, 28, 38

2, 12, 36 3, 9, 13, 14, 33 1, 5, 7, 16, 17, 30 8, 15, 23, 24, 31, 32 18, 25, 27, 29, 35, 40 10, 11, 19, 21, 22, 28, 38 4, 6, 20, 26, 34, 37, 39

10, 19, 21, 22, 28, 38 1, 5, 7, 16, 17, 30 11, 25, 27, 29, 35, 40 2, 12, 36 3, 9, 13, 14, 33 8, 15, 23, 24, 31 18, 32 4, 6, 20, 26, 34, 37, 39

traffic. For instance, in example 1 the number of inter-cell traffic for CASE algorithm is 17 and for genetic algorithm is 13. In fact, in CMS problems, other factors, such as cell utilization or number of voids and intra-cell movement, are more significant than inter-cell traffic or exceptional elements. So in this research three performance indices are proposed to compare the goodness of solution. In example 1, the number of voids is 1 for CASE algorithm and in genetic algorithm it is increased to 27 that indicate the extra intra-cell costs and reduction in cell utilization. Moreover, the similarity coefficient in [2] was not justified. For instance in example 1, based on genetic algorithm and the formed cells, in cell number one, the parts 2, 8, 13, 16 and 19 just need machines number 1 and 3, and parts 1 and 5 only need machines number 5 and 6 while all four machines are located in cell number 1. However, it is true that it decreases the inter-cell traffic but causes to the drawback of other performance factors in cell formation problem. As mentioned above, in genetic algorithm, the machine layout problem was not considered; hence it is impossible to calculate the forward movements in each cell. Then two indices i.e., ACMI and OMI are not applicable and the comparison has been done based on ACUI index. Table 10 shows the comparative performance of proposed model with CASE and genetic algorithm for example

2. The proposed solution has better ACMI and OMI compared to CASE. Moreover there is very slight ACU index difference in comparison with CASE algorithm. The genetic algorithm in comparison with the proposed algorithm has not a good functionality in example 2, which is obvious in ACUI index.

6 Conclusions In this paper, we developed an algorithm using sequence data, offering a basis for solving the layout problem in cellular manufacturing system design. Three measures of performance, average cell movement index, average cell utilization index and overall movement index, have been proposed for the evaluation of solution in comparison with CASE and genetic algorithms. The computational analysis points to the usefulness of the proposed approach. The approach presents a simultaneous solution method for the cell design and the layout problem.

Acknowledgements The authors thank Mazandaran University of Science and Technology for its support. The authors are also grateful to the anonymous referees for their valuable comments and suggestions resulting in an improved presentation.

Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 39:943953

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