Influence of assembly predicate consideration on optimal assembly sequence generation

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to find out the significant influence of assembly predicate consideration on optimal assembly sequence generation (ASG) in terms of search space, computational time and possibility of resulting practically not feasible assembly sequences. An appropriate assembly sequence results in minimal lead time and low cost of assembly. ASG is a complex combinatorial optimisation problem which deals with several assembly predicates to result an optimal assembly sequence. The consideration of each assembly predicate highly influences the search space and thereby computational time to achieve valid assembly sequence. Often, the ignoring an assembly predicate leads to inappropriate assembly sequence, which may not be physically possible, sometimes predicate assumption drastic ally raises the search space with high computational time. Design/methodology/approach – The influence of assuming and considering different assembly predicates on optimal assembly sequence generation have been clearly illustrated with examples using part concatenation method. Findings – The presence of physical attachments and type of assembly liaisons decide the consideration of assembly predicate to reduce the complexity of the problem formulation and overall computational time. Originality/value – Most of the times, assembly predicates are ignored to reduce the computational time without considering their impact on the assembly sequence problem irrespective of assembly attributes. The current research proposes direction towards predicate considerations based on the assembly configurations for effective and efficient ASG.