Association rule mining using chaotic gravitational search algorithm for discovering relations between manufacturing system capabilities and product features

Abstract

An effective data mining method to automatically extract association rules between manufacturing capabilities and product features from the available historical data is essential for efficient and cost-effective product development and production. This article proposes a chaotic gravitational search algorithm–based association rule mining method for discovering the hidden relationship between manufacturing system capabilities and product features. The extracted rules would be utilized to predict capability requirements of various machines for the new product with different features. We use two strategies to incorporate chaos into gravitational search algorithm: one strategy is to embed chaotic map functions into the gravitational constant of gravitational search algorithm; the other is to use sequences generated by chaotic maps to substitute random numbers for different parameters of gravitational search algorithm. In order to improve the applicability of chaotic gravitational search algorithm–based association rule mining, a novel overlapping measure indication is further proposed to eliminate those unuseful rules. The proposed method is relatively simple and easy to implement. The rules generated by chaotic gravitational search algorithm–based association rule mining are accurate, interesting, and comprehensible to the user. The performance comparison indicates that chaotic gravitational search algorithm–based association rule mining outperforms other regular methods (e.g. Apriori) for association rule mining. The experimental results illustrate that chaotic gravitational search algorithm–based association rule mining is capable of discovering important association rules between manufacturing system capabilities and product features. This will help support planners and engineers for the new product design and manufacturing.