Analysis of chaotic dynamics for aircraft assembly lines

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the nonlinear dynamics of the aircraft assembly lines. An approach for modeling and analyzing the production rate of an aircraft assembly line is introduced using the chaos theory. Design/methodology/approach First, two key system variables including reliability and learning ability are considered to control the dynamics model. The discrete-time dynamics equation of the production rate is established as a function of the reliability and the learning rate. Then an improved Gauss-learning curve is proposed and applied to aircraft assembling condition. Finally, the bifurcation diagrams and the maximal Lyapunov exponents are used and applied to the experimental study to analyze the dynamic behavior under different combinations of parameters. Findings On the basis of the experimental study, it is shown that chaotic behavior really exists in the aircraft assembly lines. The reliability and the Gauss-learning curve can nonlinearly affect the production rate. Originality/value This paper applied nonlinear dynamics and chaotic theory to the production analyses of the aircraft assembly lines for the first time. The proposed model has been successfully applied to a practical case, and the result justifies its advantage as well as feasibility to both theory and engineering application.