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A review of scheduling rules in flexible

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 International Journal of Computer Integrated
Manufacturing

ISSN: 0951-192X (Print) 1362-3052 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/tcim20

A review of scheduling rules in flexible

manufacturing systems

YASH P. GUPTA , MAHESH C. GUPTA & C. R. BECTOR

To cite this article: YASH P. GUPTA , MAHESH C. GUPTA & C. R. BECTOR (1989) A review
of scheduling rules in flexible manufacturing systems, International Journal of Computer
Integrated Manufacturing, 2:6, 356-377, DOI: 10.1080/09511928908944424

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 INT. J. COMPUTER INTEGRATED MANUFACTURING, VOL.
A review of scheduling rules In flexible
manufacturing systems
YASH P, GUPTA, MAHESH C. GUPTA and C. R. BECTOR
Abstract. In this paper, the literature dealing with the parts
scheduling problem in flexible manufacturing systems (FMS)
has been reviewed. Although the parts scheduling problem is
Downloaded by [University of Wisconsin Platteville] at 06:25 19 May 2016
only part of a much larger decision-making process, it has
fundamental implications on the overall performance of the
system: internally by affecting the utilization of expensive
resources (c.g, machine tools and fixtures), and externally by
affecting its responsiveness to meet the changing customer
demands. This paper has two objectives: (1) to develop a
framework within which to discuss the current literature on
dispatching rules; and (2) to compare the developed list of
dispatching rules and performance criteria from the surveyed
literature with that desired by the FMS operators. The research
findings arc critically reviewed and. analysed according to
various two-dimcnsicnal classifications. The results from real-
life case studies of FMS. are also discussed. Finally, the results
arc summarized to present suggestions for future research
efforts.
1. Introduction
The concept of flexible manufacturing systems (FMS)
has brought about signifIcant advantages over traditional
batch manufacturing in the areas of work-in-progress
(WIP) levels of inventory and utilization of resources,
specifically in the machine tools industry (Groover 1985,
Hatvany 1985, Ranky 1983, Stecke and Suri 1986).
Jaikumar (1986) stated that the average utilization of
resources in such systems varied between 52% and 84%
and manufacturing overheads declined by 92 %.
Flexible manufacturing systems are bcing implemented
in various forms. These systems can be classified across a
number of dimensions such as mode of operation, level of
automation and degree of flexibility (see Fig. 1). From the
viewpoint of the scheduling procedures, Rachamadugu
Authors: Yash P. Gupru. Department of Management, and Mahesh C.
Gupur. Department of lndustrinl Engineering, University of Louisville,
Louisville, KY 40292, USA; and C. R. Bccror. Department of
Actuarial and Management Sciences, Faculty of Management, Uni-
versity of Manitoba, wtnnipcg. Manitoba, R3T 2N2, Canada.
0951.192X/89 13.00 © 1989 Tayler & FrancisLrd.
2, NO.6, 356-377
and Stecke (1987) further categorized the flexible manu-
facturing systems into dedicated FMS and random FMS,
and flexible flow systems into flexible assembly systems
and flexible transfer lines.
Generally, when an FMS is being planned, the objec-
tive is to design a system which will be most efficient in the
production of the entire range of parts. The effective
installation requires the solution to design, production
planning, scheduling and the actual control problems of
an FMS. Carrie and Pestopoulos (1985) recognized the
important management decisions that have to be made
prior to its design and implementation. Stecke (1981)
developed a hierarchical scheme comprising five produc-
tion planning problems which must be solved prior to an
FMS's operation. At the subsequent level, on-time sched-
uling problems have to be solved such as input sequence
determination and alternate route selection. Lastly, the
solutions to the control problems such as system main-
tenance, machine breakdowns, quality control and
output control need to be obtained (Nof et at. 1979, Stecke
1985). Figure 2 shows these problems and decisions in a
systematic framework.
A variety of analytical as well as simulation models
have been proposed to deal with some of the above
problems in FMSs (Suri 1985). Many excellent attempts
have been made in consolidating research efforts dealing
with these models. For example, see Buzacott (1985),
Buzacott and Yao (1986), Heragu and Kusiak (1988),
Kalkunte et al. (1986), Stecke (1985) and van Looveren
et al. (1986). A number of comprehensive surveys on
installations of FMSs in various nations have been writ-
ten by several authors including: Dupont-Gatelmand
(1982), Hatvany (1983), and Hutchinson (1979).
Browne et al. (1984) reviewed various types of flexibility
inherent in FMS such as: machine flexibility, route
flexibility, product flexibility, process flexibility, operation
flexibility, volume flexibility, expansion flexibility and
production flexibility. ]aikumar (1986) surveyed about
70 % of worldwide installed FMSs and observed that the
terms flexibility and the management of flexibility 'were
 Scheduling rules in FMSs 357

HIGH

JOB SHOP
PART
VARIETY NC MACHINING CENTRE

FLEXIBLE MANUFAcruRING CElL

FLEXIBLE MANUFACTURING SYSTEMS

FLEXIBLE FLOW SYSTIMS

LOW L- :>

IJJW HIGH
PART VOLUME
Downloaded by [University of Wisconsin Platteville] at 06:25 19 May 2016

LEVEL OF AUTOMATION
--------------------:>
Figure 1. Classification of advanced manufacturing systems.

FLEXIBLE MANUFACTOlUNG SYSTEMS

DESIGN PLANNING SCHEDULING: CONTROL

PROBLEMS PROBLEMS PROBLEMS PROBLENS

" PRODUcr RANGE " PARTTYPESELECTION " ON-UNESCHEDUUNG " MAINTENANCE

PROBLEM PROBLEM PROBLEM PROBLEM

" MACHINE CAPACITY " MACHINE GROUPING - DISPATCHING RULES " QUALITY CONTROL
PROBLEM PROBLEM - ALTERNATE ROUTES PROBLEM
- M.<: BEAKDOWN
"TRANSPORTATION "PRODUCTIONRATIO "OUTPUTCONTROL
PROBLEM PROBLEM PROBLEM

" FlXTURING " RESOURCE ALLOCATION

PROBLEM PROBLEM

"PAUEI'SElECTION " LOADING PROBLEM

PROBLEM

" PROCESS PLANNING

PROBLEM
Figure 2. Hierarchy of FMS problems.

poorly understood. Slack (1989) studied how managers
viewed the flexibility of their manufacturing systems. He
found that flexibility was the least understood manufac-
turing objective. In the past few years, a number of
successful attempts have been made to quantify the types
of flexibility. In a recent paper, Gupta and Goyal (1989)
synthesized the literature on manufacturing flexibility.
Stecke (1985) suggested frameworks to study planning
and scheduling problems of FMSs. Buzacott (1985),
Buzacott and Yao (1986) and van Looveren et al. (1986)
reviewed the planning models and discussed planning
techniques (queueing networks, mathematical program-
ming, and simulation) within the FMS framework.
Stecke and Solberg (1981) provided an excellent review
of part loading models in computerized manufacturing
systems. A variety of plausible loading objectives have
been suggested and optimization models have been
formulated.
Kusiak (1985 b) presented a taxonomy to study mater-
ial handling problems related to FMSs and' Automated
Storage and Retrieval Systems' (AS{RSs). Stecke and
Browne (1985) discussed various types of material hand-
ling systems (MHS) that are relevant to material handling
in FMS and, further, categorized such MHSs with
respect to their relative flexibility of various types.
Heragu and Kusiak (1988) suggested four basic types of
 :J58 Y. P. Gupta et al.
layouts of machines and the algorithms to solve them.
Gcrshwin et al. (1986) established a framework for study-
illg manufacturing systems issues from a control theorist's
viewpoint and showed how ongoing research could be
described within this framework. Gershwin (1989) pro-
vidcd an in-depth survey of the optimal control theory
approach to the control problems of FMS.
Kaner and Adelsberger (1987) reviewed the expert
systems (BS) scheduling research and commented on the
most comprehensively reported applications of ES in this
area. Further, Steffen (1986) surveyed the literature on
Al-bascd scheduling systems on the basis of historical,
methodological, application and implementation perspec-
tives.
Among the problems stated above and shown in Fig. 2,
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the FMS scheduling problems have received relatively
more attention among researchers and practitioners.
These problems arc important because of their own
intrinsic value as well as their role as a crucial step in the
implementation of such manufacturing systems. The
literature on scheduling has matured to the point that a
number of survey and review articles have been written
(for instance, Smith et al. (1986) and Racharnadugu and
Stucke (1987». Smith et al. investigated the various desir-
able scheduling criteria preferred by the FMS users and
the level of satisfaction of the FMS users with the
scheduling software in use. They found that most com-
panies consider meeting due dates, maximization of
system utilization and machine utilization, and minimi-
zation of in-process inventory being the most important
criteria. They argued that the scheduling procedure
developed by the researchers does not seem to adequately
satisfy the needs of industry. Rachamadugu and Stecke
(1987) defined various classes of advanced manufacturing
systems, and distinguished the employed scheduling pro-
cedures with those of conventional job shop systems.
They also provided an extensive literature review of
analytical and algorithmic approaches to the scheduling
problems of automated systems. Among other con-
clusions, they suggested that loading decisions should
now be considered as a part of scheduling decisions and
that system performance be evaluated when these two
decisions are made simultaneously. Because of the broad
scope of their paper, Rachamadugu and Stecke (1987) did
1101 review the scheduling literature with respect to the
dispatching rules in detail. It is, therefore, timely and
appropriate to develop a framework to synthesize the
literature on dispatching rules.
In this paper, the published FMS scheduling literature
is reviewed from two perspectives-the performance cri-
reria opted for and the type of on-line dispatching tech-
niques applied. Various studies with respect to the
dispatching rules have been systematically categorized
with respect to the type of dispatching rules applied, the
performance measures used and the FMS configuration
considered. The literature is critically reviewed to draw
some useful inferences and suggestions for future research
in context of industrial scheduling practices are provided.
2. FMS scheduling problem
Glossen and Malstrom (1982) stated that hundreds of
robots and millions of dollars worth of computer-
controlled equipment are worthless if they are under-
utilized or if they spend their time working on the wrong
part because of poor planning and scheduling.
As shown in Fig. 3, scheduling in automated manufac-
turing systems can be described by a hierarchical struc-
ture ranging from top level decision making to detailed
level scheduling decisions. The hierarchical structure of
FMS planning and scheduling problems has been
addressed in a number of different ways such as top
level/detailed level scheduling (Vaithianathan 1982), and
medium-term production planning/short-term produc-
tion planning (Menon 1985).
The former type (i.e. medium-term planning or top
level scheduling) emphasizes planning for production and
plant operations over extended periods of time which may
include, for example, part type selection, resource (such
as tools and fixtures) planning and generation of sequen-
ces of operations. The objective at this level is the
coordination of activities for multiple function areas. The
output of this scheduling function is a tentative plan or a
master schedule. It sets the production targets and serves
as a basis to estimate, plan for and procure resources
(Walker and Miller 1986, Vaithianathan and McRoberts
1981).
At the detailed level, scheduling (or short-term produc-
tion planning) controls production over the course of each
day and provides 'a means to achieve the production
targets. It attempts to find the optimal routeing of jobs
combined with making efficient use of expensive resources
which are subject to environmental and procedural con-
straints. These objectives are accomplished by allocating
resources such as machine tools, fixtures and raw mater-
ials according to time (due dates) and place (routeing)
constraints (Walker and Miller 1986). Jobs are assigned
to specific work stations (WS) on a weekly, daily or hourly
basis taking into account the type, quantity and place-
ment of resources as well as any associated time values
and processing priorities (Harrington 1984, Groover
1985). At this level, the scheduling problem poses a
unique and challenging problem in several ways. For
example (Chang et al. 1984): (1) after a work-part is
loaded, which machines should it visit and at what time
should it be processed on specific machines?; (2) if a
machine fails, how should the schedule be adjusted for
 Scheduling rules in FMSs
FMS SCHEDULING
I
TOP LEVEL SCHEDULING
LOADING PROBLEMS
HEURISTICS/ALGORITHMS
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STATIC
I I
LOCAL GLOBAL
Figure 3. FMS scheduling taxonomy.
each work-part in the system?; and (3) if a high priority
work-part is loaded, then how should the schedule be
adjusted for each work-part to accommodate the high
priority job?
While the top level production planning problems have
already been extensively reviewed (Stecke 1983, Stecke
and Solberg 1981b, Sarin and Wilhelm 1983, Kusiak
1986, Menon 1985), the literature on dispatching rules is
reviewed in the present paper.
3. Dispatching problems
Dispatching rules are used primarily to help the pro-
duction manager on the shop floor to make decisions
(described earlier). If such rul~s are to be of any use to the
manager, the performance of such rules must be demon-
strated against the criterion or criteria which the manager
perceives as being the most relevant. In the literature,
terms such as scheduling rules, priority rules or dispatch-
ing rules are often used synonymously. Cere (1966) has
made an attempt to distinguish between priority rules and
dispatching rules and also between static and dynamic
priority rules and dispatching rules and also between
static and dynamic priority rules. Table 1 provides the
definition of these terms.
A review of published studies reveals that at least two
approaches have been applied to the FMS dispatching
359
DETAILED LEVEL SCHEDULING
I
ON-LINE SCHEDULING
I
SCHEDULING RULES
I[
DYNAMIC
LOCAL GLOBAL
problem in an attempt to identify the dispatching rules.
The most general approach involves a set of related
decisions which are classified as: (1) pre-release decisions;
(2) part-releasing decisions; and (3) part-routeing
decisions (Fig. 4-). Several pre-releasing decisions have to be
made at the arrival of an order, such as (a) setting the due
date, (b) qualifying the order, (c) determining the priori-
ties, (d) determining the lot sizes: and (e) setting the part
routeing. Part release decisions comprise two basic
elements: (a) which part to select next; and (b) when
should it be released. This is usually termed a part
dispatching decision, i.e. selecting the part to release
next. Part routeing decisions can be made in the pre-release
phase or upon completion of each operation. When no
alternative routes exist, the decision is normally made in
the pre-release phase whereas if alternative routeings
exist, it is usually better to delay the routeing decisions as
much as possible (see, for example, Nof et al. (1978),
Buzacott and Shantikumar (1980), Denzler and Boe
(1987c».
Another approach most commonly adopted by resear-
chers to study dispatching rules involves two steps: first,
either formulate a loading model using one or more of the
objective functions and a set of appropriate constraints
and solve it, or develop some loading strategies; and
second, evaluate the performance of such loading strat-
egies using appropriate dispatching rules (see, for
example, Lin and Lu (1986), Bell and Billalis (1982),
 360 Y. P. Gupta et a1.

Table I. Basic definitions (adapted from Gere (1966».
I. A priority 111le or priority function is that function which
assigns to each waiting job a scalar value, the minimum of
which, among jobs waiting at a machine, determines the jobs
to be selected over all other jobs for scheduling.
2. A scheduling rule dictates which job among those waiting for
service is to be scheduled in preference to the others.
'Scheduling a job' means scheduling the next operation of
the job.
3. The class of priority rules we shall call random or simple
include any rule whose priority function is not a function of
the job file. The data derived job file may not be used, e.g.
number of operations, operation times and due dates. On
the other hand. there is a class of priority rules known as
complex rules which employs the data from job file in one way
or the other.
Downloaded by [University of Wisconsin Platteville] at 06:25 19 May 2016
Shanker and Tzen (1987), and Stecke and Solberg
(1981 a). This approach constitutes a part of the decision-
making framework developed in the former approach
(Fig. 4). Many decisions are assumed to be made
beforehand while solving loading problems, see Stecke
(1983), so that the impact of various dispatching rules
could be analysed based on the performance criterion
selected.
4. Scheduling rules
In this section, an attempt is made to classify the
surveyed dispatching rules into simple priority rules, a
. combination of simple priority rules, and other rules and
heuristics.

4. A static priority rule or priority function is that function

which assigns to each job a scalar value before scheduling
begins and then either remains unchanged or varies in some
way independent of the schedule and of the job file.
5. A dynamic priority rule or priority function is that function
which assigns to each job a dynamic scalar value which
reflects the status of jobs from time to time as the schedule
progresses,
6. A local priority rule only requires information about the job
competing for service at a particular machine centre.
7. A gtobal priority rule requires additional information about
jobs or machine status at other centres or waiting lines.
4.1. Classification of scheduling rules
We now present the scheduling rules following the
schema proposed by Panwalker and Iskander (1977). An
attempt is made to use the exact code used by them
wherever possible. The code names used for different
rules mayor may not coincide with the names used by
other researchers. Moreover, the categorization pre-
sented here is not unique and some rules can be put into
different categories.

Part
Routetng Decisions
• Alternate Process Plans

9 Part Release' Decisions

Pre Release
Decisions
. Loading Scheduling
• Setting the Due Date Models Rilles and
• Qualifying the Order and - Algorithms
• Deterrnlnlng the Lot Size Strategies
• Assigning the Prlorities

• Setting the part Routeing

Figure 4. On-line dispatching taxonomy.

 Scheduling rules in FMSs
4.1.1. Simple priority rules (SPR) related to
Processing time (PT):
SI Select the job with the' shortest imminent
operation time'. (Bell and Bilalis 1982,
Carrie and Petsopoulos 1985, Chan and
Pak 1986, Chang et al. 1986, Co et al.
1981, Denzler and Boe 1987 c, Elmaraghy
1981, Lin and Lu 1986, Schriber and
Stecke 1986, Shanker and Tzen 1985,
Slomp et al, 1988, Stecke and Solberg
1981 a, Vaithianathan 1982).
LI Select the job with the 'largest imminent
operation time' (Bell and Bilalis 1982,
Chang et al. 1986, Han et al. 1989, Shan-
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ker and Tzen 1985, Stecke and Solberg
1981 a).
SR Select the job with the' shortest remaining
processing time' (Co et al. 1981, Han et al.
1989, Nof et al. 1979, Stecke and Solberg
1981 a).
LR Select the job with the 'largest remaining
processing time' (Nof et al. 1979, Stecke
and Solberg 1981 a).
Due dala (DD):
EDD Select the job with the 'earliest due date'.
OPNDD Select the job with 'earliest operation due
date' (Denzler and Boe 1987 c, Pourbabai
1986).
MDD Select the job with the 'earliest modified
due date'. (Raman et al. 1986).
MOD Select the job with the 'earliest modified
operation due date' (Raman et al. 1986).
Number of operations (NOP):
FOPNR Select the job that has 'fewest operations
remaining' (Chang et al. 1986, Stecke and
Solberg 1981 a).
MOPNR Select the job that has 'most operations
remaining' (Chang et at. 1986, Shanker
and Tzen 1985, Stecke and Solberg
1981 a).
Cost rules (CR)
Cost Select the job with 'minimum tardiness
and processing cost' (Dar-El and Sarin
1986).
Setup lime rules (STR):
HGST Assign highest priority to 'highest setup
time'. Select the job with highest priority
(Vaithianathan 1982).
SGST Assign lowest priority to 'highest setup
361
time'. Select the job with highest priority
(Vaithianathan 1982).
Random Arrival Times (A TR):
FIFO Select the job with 'first in, first out' (Bell
and Bilalis 1982, Carrie and Petsopoulos
1985, Chan and Pak 1986, Chang et al.
1986, Co et al. 1981, Elmaraghy 1981,
Lin and Lu 1986, Nof et al. 1979,
Schriber and Stecke 1987, Wang 1986).
LIFO Select the job with 'last in, first out'
(Denzler and Boe 1987 c, Kanet 1987,
Kimemia and Gershwin 1983).
RDM Select in 'random order' (Choi and Mal-
strom 1988, Elmaraghy 1981).
EAT
Assign the highest priority to the job with
earliest available time and select it (Pour-
babai 1986).
o
Slack rules (SLK):
S-1 Select the job with the 'least amount of
slack' (available time before due date time
for remaining operations) (Chan and Pak
1986).
S-2 Select the job with the least 'static' slack
(difference between due date and arrival
time) (Vaithianathan 1982).
RSTPI Select the job with the 'least ratio of the
job slack time to the remaining processing
time' (Vaithianathan 1982).
Machine (M):
WINQ Select the job that will go on to its next
operation at a machine that has the least
work load (Choi and Malstrom 1988,
Dar-El and Sarin 1986, Denzler and Boe
1987 a, Lin and Lu 1986).
SMCPT Select the job that has shortest machining
centre processing time at the next centre.
NINQ Select the job whose direct successor
machine has the shortest queue (Choi and
Malstrom 1988, Co el al, 1981).
Tool (T):
MTM Select the job which includes 'least
number of tool movement' (Han el al.
1989).
4.1.2. Combination oj simple priority rules (CSPR)
SPT.TOT Select the job with the' highest product of
its shortest imminent processing time and
total processing time' (Slomp et al. 1988,
Stecke and Solberg 1981 a).
 362 Y. P. Gupta et al.

SPT/TOT Select the job with the 'highest ratio of its
shortest imminent processing time and
total processing time' (Slomp et al. 1988,
Stecke and Solberg 1981 a).
LPT. TOT Select the job with the highest product of
its largest imminent processing time and
total processing time' (Stecke and Solberg
1981 a).
LPT/TOT Select the job with the' highest ratio of its
shortest imminent processing time and
total processing time' (Stecke and Solberg
1981 a).
MOD/MOD Select the job with the 'highest ratio of
modified operation due date to modified
due date' (Raman et al. 1986).
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ESTA Select the job with 'earliest starting time
with alternatives considered' (Iwata et al.
1982).
EFTA Select the job with 'earliest finishing time
with alternatives considered' (Iwata et al.
1982, Siomp et al. 1988).
4.1.3. Heuristics and algorithms (H&A)
HMS Select the job with 'highest mean sim-
ilarity' (Vaithianathan 1982).
ALGOR'M To select the next job 'use algorithm'
(Chang and Sullivan 1984, Chang et al.
1986, Dar-EI and Sarin 1986, Kanet
1987, Kimemia and Gershwin 1983,

PR/TR Select the job if the' ratio of its remaining
production requirement to original
requirement is larger than the ratio of
remaining production time to day's pro-
duction time' (Nof et al. 1979).
CRITICAL Select the job with the 'highest critical
ratio' (Denzler and Boe 1987 c, Raman
etal.1986).
SOTA Select the job with 'shortest operation
time with alternatives considered' (Iwata
et al. 1982).
Pourbabai 1986).
5. Information on surveyed articles
In this section, we provide classified information on the
articles surveyed. It is categorized in three parts: (a)
performance measure considered; (b) dispatching rule(s)
used; and (c) the system configuration.
Table 2 provides a summary of the classification

Table 2. Classification of literature.

SPR

Criteria PT DD NOP CR STR ATR SLK M T CSPR H&A

I. Production rate [ 1-7] [3,7) [1-5,19,20J [2,19) [4) [5-7) [23)

2. Machine/system [ 1,2,5,6,8,9) [3,10] [ 18] [ 1,3,5,8-10,20] [ 18,21] [5,6,22] [ 18,23]
utilization [9]
3. Throughput/fiowtime [1,3,8,9,11-15] [12] [3,11] [15] [1,3,8,9,11,12] [15] [9] [ 12-14,22) [ 11,24]
[ 15J
4. Meeting the due date
Mean tardiness [ 12] [ 12,13] [12] [ 12,13] [25]
Maximum tardiness [ 17] [18] [ 17] [ 18] [ 17] [18]
Others [9,16] [ 13J [9,16) [16] [9) [13 )
5. Other criteria
In-process inventory [ 15) [15] [15] [15]
Flowtime variance [12] [12] [ 12] [ 12]
Lead time [16] [ 16] [16]
Setup changeover [15] [ 15] [ IS] [15]
Output capacity [8] [8]
MHS utilization [22)

SPR. simple priority rules; PT, processing time; DO, due date; NOP. number of operations; CR, cost rules; STR, setup rules; ATR, random arrivals;
SLK, slack rules; M, machine; T, 1001; CSPR, combination of SPR; H&A, heuristics and algorithms.
References: II] Carrie and Petsopoulos (1985), [2J CO et al. (1981), [3] Elmaraghy (1981), [fJ Han a at. (1989), [5) Nor rial. (1979), (6]
Schriberand Stccke (1986, 1987), [7] Steeke and Solberg (1981 a), [8J Bell and Bilalis (1982), [9J Lin and Lu (1986), [10) Shankerand Tzen (1985),
1111 Chang rial. (1986), [121 Denzler and Boe(1987e), [13] Raman rial. (1986), [lfJ Slomprlal.(l988), [IS) Vailhianathan(1982), [16] Chan
and Pak (1986), [17) Pourbabai (1986), [18] Dar-EI and Sarin (1986), [19) Choi and Malstrom (1988), [20J Kanct et al. (1987), [21 J Denzlerand
Boe (1987a), [221 Iwata r/al. (1982), [23] Kanet (1987), [2f) Chang and Sullivan (198f), [251 Kiran and Alptekin (1985).
 Scheduling rules in FMSs
between the performance criterion and the type of dis-
patching rules employed by the various studies. The
system configuration is summarized as part (c). An
attempt is made to capture the major factors being
considered in a particular paper in order to enhance the
conceptualization of the results reported later in this
paper. Based on this information, conclusions are derived
with respect to the types of manufacturing systems
studied (for example, dedicated and random FMS) and
the various factors considered while performing a simula-
tion study (for example, secondary resources and job
characteristics) .
5 1. Bell and Bilalis (1982)
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(a) Machine utilization, throughput times, and the
output capacity.
(b) SI, LI, FIFO.
(c) Digital simulation of a hypothetical FMS is used.
The system consists of two lathes, one drill and I
conveyer line. Handling devices dedicated to only one
machine tool are used. Each pallet can carry one to five
parts, from One batch only. The average batch size is ten
and its maximum value over a hundred. A new batch
starts when all the parts from the previous batch have
been machined.
5.2. Carrie and Petsopoulos (1985)
(a) Production rate, system utilization.
(b) SI, FIFO.
(c) An FMS commissioned by a Scottish engineering
company consisting of five similar CNC horizontal
machining centres and one special horizontal machining
centre is simulated. All the machines have a tool maga-
zine with a capacity of a hundred tools. Castings are fixed
and moved on pallets by an AGV following a wire guide
in the floor. At the load/unload area and at each machine
there are two pallet stands acting as buffers. Currently,
seven part types are involved, with operation times
varying between 14 and 286 minutes, and the total
processing time varying between 832 and 1314 minutes.
5.3. Chan and Fak (1986)
(a) Cost of tardiness, makespan, average lead time.
(b) SI, FIFO, S-1.
(c) Digital simulation in Fortran of a hypothetical FMS
is used. The system consists of four machining centres
connected through a fixed conveyor system. Each
machining centre has a local storage buffer.
363
5.4. Chang and Sullivan ( 1984 b)
(a) Total flow time.
(b) Algorithms.
(c) A heuristic algorithm to generate active schedules
for a general dynamic shop (e.g. FMS) consisting of
several groups of similar or parallel work stations is
proposed. Significant transfer times exist between work
stations. Also, a particular operation can be performed by
different work stations with different operation times.
5.5. Chang et al. (1986)
(a) Mean flow time, throughput.
(b) SI, LI, FOPNR, MOPNR, FIFO, Algorithm.
(c) A combined network and discrete-event simulation
model of a hypothetical FMS is developed. The system
consists of four work stations, three part types, one
transfer line, and 20 pallets.
5.6. Choi and Malstrom (1988)
(a) Actual system effectivity, total travel time of parts,
production output, throughput time, work-in-process,
and production lateness.
(b) Random, FIFO, WINQ, NINQ.
(c) An actual FMS was modelled using actual data. All
process sequences and times are based on actual data
obtained from an FMS recently installed by a midwestern
manufacturing facility. Seven part families are con-
sidered. The physical simulator is used to evaluate work
scheduling rules. The simulator consisted of the following
major facilities: an AS/RS with seven parallel storage
areas for raw materials and one area for semi-finished
parts, an AS/RS cart, six parallel and identical NC
machining centres, a turning cell (including a robot, two
vertical NC lathes, and a washing station), overhead
conveyors and many other necessary facilities.
5.7. Co et al. (1988)
(a) Throughput rate.
(b) SI, SR, FIFO, NINQ.
(c) The computer simulation is used to evaluate the
performance of sequencing rules on the throughput of a
FMS when the queue-length is small. The closed network
modelling approach is used to simulate the FMS. The
hypothesis tested by them is that in closed systems of short
queue-lengths, the mean flow times of jobs processed is
insensitive with respect to the sequencing rules.
 364 Y. P. Gupta et al.
5.8. Dar-El and Sarin (1986)
(a) Machine utilization, minimum job tardiness.
(b) Cost, WINQ, Algorithm.
(c) Digital simulation in PLI of Ingersol Rand's FMS
in Roanoke, Virginia, is used. The system consists of two
milling, two boring, two drilling machines connected with
each other through a fixed conveyor system. Each
machine has one pallet storage space associated with it.
There are 25 part types to be processed and each part type
may have alternative routing.
5.9. Denzler and Boe (1987a)
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(a) Machine utilization rate.
(b) WINQ.
(c) A dedicated FMS which manufactures eight types
of transmission housings is simulated. The system is
comprised of five head indexes, II module machining
centres, two load stations and two unload stations. The
system has 37 carts and 51 pallet fixtures. Each pallet
fixture is designed to position one of the eight parts. Each
machine has the capacity to store two parts before and
two parts after processing on its machine shuttle. The
automatic transmission cases to be machined are attached
to pallet fixtures and then moved by carts to the various
machines on a dual loop fixed-track tow line system.
5. 10. Denzler and Boe (198 7 c)
(a) Mean part flow time, part flow time variance,
percentage tardy jobs, mean tardiness.
(b) SI, OPNDD, LIFO, CRITICAL.
(c) A hypothetical random FMS with a relatively
smaller production batch is considered. The actual pro-
cessing times are randomly generated upon arrival.
5.11. Elmaraghy (1981)
(a) System utilization, throughput time, production
rate. '
(b) SI, FOPNR, FIFO, RANDOM.
(c) A FORTRAN based simulator FMSSIM is
developed. The simulator is a modular, user-oriented
package which allows the designer to evaluate a wide
range of systems with varied design parameters and select
an efficient configuration.
5.12. Han et al. (1989)
(a) Throughput rate.
(b) LI, MTM, SR, RAN.
(c) The FMS configuration consists of several machin-
ing centres, each of which has a tool magazine, a tool crib
which stores not assigned tools, and a tool transfer device.
No material handling is required because each part visits
only one of the machining centres for its complete
processing. Therefore, the major considerations involve
the initial tool loading and subsequently, the transfer of
tools either from one machine to another or from tool crib
to another machine.
5.13. Iwata et al. (1982)
(a) Makespan, mean flow time, machine utilization,
MHS utilization.
(b) SOTA, ESTA, EFTA.
(c) An FMS is modelled as a system consisnng of
machine tools, a loading/unloading station, buffer
storages, and material and cutting tool transportation
system. The system consists of three machine tools which
can perform several different kinds of machining opera-
tions, two types of buffer storages installed in front of each
machine tool, two carts which can move along a track
in both directions, a loading station and an unloading
station, and a cutting tool transportation system. Each
buffer capacity is equal to a unit. Ten different kinds of
part are manufactured. Each part is processed through
ten processing stages according to a specified sequence,
and two alternative machine tools are permitted for each
processing stage of a part.
5.14. Kimemia and Gershwin (1983, 1985)
(a) System utilization, production rate.
(b) LIFO, Algorithm.
(c) While a four-level control structure to compensate
for work station failures and changes in part requirements
is proposed, a simulation model is developed for a flexible
transfer line. It consists of two work stations and down
stream buffer. Each station has an initial buffer with a
capacity for five pieces.
5.15. Kiran and Alptekin (1985)
(a) Mean tardiness.
(b) Algorithm.
(c) A scheduling system for an hypothetical FMS is
considered for which its actual state, and a set of parts
 Scheduling rules in FMSs
with known processing time requirements and due dates
are known and given. It determines the start and comple-
tion time of operations of each part to be produced.
5.16. Lin and Lu (1986)
(a) Machine utilization, mean waiting time, mean flow
time, and number of late jobs.
(b) SI, FIFO, WINQ.
(c) A hypothetical FMS is simulated which consists of
four machining centres, a line transportation cart and a
load/unloading area.
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5.17. No! et al. (1979)
(a) Machine utilization, production rate.
(b) SR, LR, FIFO, PR/TR.
(c) A hypothetical versatile manufacturing system (a
prototype of an actual facility) is simulated. The system
consists of three pairs of machining centres intercon-
nected with a loop conveyor. A large number of parts can
be produced, each of which may have up to four alternat-
ive process plans. In the analysis different sub-sets of part
types are considered.
5.18. Pourbabai (1986)
(a) Maximum tardiness.
(b) OPNDD, EAT, Algorithm.
(c) A mixed binary LP model for a hypothetical flexible
batch manufacturing system consisting of a set of work
stations; loading and unloading stations linked by a MHS
is suggested. Each job is assumed to be a batch of
homogeneous parts, which may require more than one
stage of operation at each work station. The due date and
availability time of each job can be specified.
5. 19. Raman et al. (1986)
(a) Mean tardiness, proportion of tardy jobs, mean
flow time, standard deviation of tardiness.
(b) MDD, MOD, MOD/MOD, CRITICAL.
(c) The digital simulation of a hypothetical FMS IS
developed which is comprised of five machining centres
and a cart. Twenty part types are considered, arriving
at the system randomly. There is a load/unload station
where incoming jobs are received and to which the
finished jobs are routed.
365
5.20. Schriber and Stecke (1986)
(a) Machine utilization, production rate.
(b) SI, FIFO.
(c) The hypothetical FMS considered consists of one
milling machine, two drilling machines, and two vertical
turret lathes. The AGVs are used as a transportation
device. It has a centralized buffer which can be used by
any part type. The model does not take into account the
geometric layout of the FMS. All part types visit
machines in a mill-drill-lathe sequence and no machine
type can perform substitute functions.
5.21. Shanker and Tzen (1985)
(a) Machine utilization, number of late jobs.
(b) SI, LT, MOPNR, FIFO.
(c) A hypothetical FMS is simulated. It has m machines
and each tool magazine has a known tool slot capacity.
The jobs arrive in random order. For each job the
processing time, tool slot requirement and due dates are
known.
5.22. Siomp et al. (1988)
(a) Makespan, mean flow time.
(b) SI, SPT.TOT, SPT/TOT, EFTA.
(c) The FMS consists of a load station, an unload
station and two machining centres. The machining
centres can perform the same processes. However, one
machining centre is more efficient than the other and
consequently the processing times are smaller for one
machining centre. There are local buffers in front of each
machining centre with the capacity of two parts. One
transport device and two operators are assumed. The
moving times of the secondary resources are also con-
sidered.
5.23. Stecke and Solberg (1981 a)
(a) Production rate.
(b) SI, LT, SR, LR, FOPNR, MOPNR, SPT.TOT,
SPT/TOT, LPT.TOT, LPT/TOT.
(c) The Caterpillar FMS is simulated. The system
consists of four large five-axis machining centres, three
four-axis machining centres, two vertical turret lathes and
an inspection station. Each machine has a limited tool
magazine capacity. The transporters run on a straight
track and carry parts from machine to machine. Sixteen
stations and a load/unload station is provided.
 366 Y. P. Gupta et al.

5.24. Vaithianathan (1982) research on dispatching rules in an FMS environment is

(a) Throughput time, setup change over, in-process
inventory.
(b) SI, HGST, SGST, S-2, RSTPI, HMS.
(c) Digital simulation of a hypothetical static FMS is
used. The system consists of n part types and M machin-
ing centres. Each part type requires a number of opera-
tions to be performed on different machining centres.
5.25. Wang (1986)
(a) Production rate/output rate.
(b) FIFO.
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still at an early stage. In spite of the fact that the on-line
scheduling function has a fundamental impact on the
overall system utilization, no fr<{mework has been pro-
posed in the literature to study this problem. Recognizing
the abundance of information available on the scheduling
rules and frameworks in conventional production systems
(for example, Panwalker and Iskander 1977, Blackstone
et al. 1982), we anticipate that there will be an increasing
number of studies conducted in this area of FMS in the
near future. Therefore, it will be helpful to provide a
framework to direct the future studies in this area. The
need for elaborate studies in FMS scheduling has recently
been recognized and many ongoing research projects
have been reported in the recent conferences on FMSs

(c) Three hypothetical FMS configurations are sim-
ulated. Each consists of one machining centre, two
machining centres, and three machining centres respect-
ively. Each machining centre has its buffer storage. Five
different part types are produced in each system configur-
ation and each part type has a unique routeing associated
with it.
6. Discussion
From the review of the literature, it IS clear that
(e.g. Denzler and Boe 1987 c, Chang et al. 1986, Morton
and Smunt 1984).
The analysis of the performance measures addressed in
the literature is summarized in Table 3. It can be seen
that among the most intensely studied criteria are produc-
tion rate, machine/system utilization and throughput
time or flow time. A number of attempts have been made
addressing the due date related evaluation criteria, how-
ever, there is only a limited number of studies dealing
with a specific criterion within this category (Table 2). In
the following section, the results obtained by several
researchers are discussed.

Table 3. Scheduling criteria (ranking from literature).

Criteria
Ranking (referred in References) Articles'[ COUnl

I. Maximizing machine/system utilization [1-11] 12

2. Minimizing throughput/mean flow time [1,2,5,6,8,12-17] 11
:1. Maximizing production rate [2,5,7,9,10,18-21] 10
4. Lateness related criteria: 7
Minimize mean tardiness [15,22,23]
Minimize maximum tardiness [3,24]
Others [8,25]
5. Othn- criteria: 6
Minimizing in-process inventory [17J
Minimize flow time variance [14]
Minimize average lead time [25J
Minimize setup changeover [17J
Maximizing output capacity [1]
Maximizing MHS utilization [6)

til] Bell and Bilalis (1982). [2] Carrie and Petsopoulos (1985), [3] Dar·EI and Sarin(1986), [4] Denzler
and Boe (1987 a), [5} Elmaraghy(1981), [6} Iwata er al. (1982). [7] Kaner (1987), [8] Linand Lu(1986),
[9J Noret al. (1979). [10] Schriber and Stocke (1986. 1987), [11] Shanker and Tzen (1985), [12J Chang
and Sullivan (1984), [13] Chang et al, (1986), [14] Denzler and Boe (1987 e), [15] Raman et al. (1986),
[16J Siomp et oi. (1988), [17} Vaithianathan (1982). [18J Choi and Malstrom (1988), [19J CO et ai.
(1981), [20] Han el al. (1989), [21] Stecke and Solberg (1981 a), (22) Diesch and Malstrom (1985), [23]
Kiran and Alptckin (1985). [24] Pourbabai (1986), 125] Chan and Pak(1986).
 Scheduling rules in FMSs 367

6.1. Results related to the production rale criterion
One of the earliest studies on the dispatching problem
is by Nof el al. (1979). They explained the signif-
cance/impact of various planning and scheduling issues
such as part type selection, part mix ratio and alternate
routeing. Their simulation study assumed that the part
type selection and part mix problems have been solved
a priori, and examined the effect of two aspects of parts
scheduling (i.e. entry rules and dispatching rules) on
system performance in a breakdown free FMS. The entry
of parts in the system was divided into two types, initial
entry and general entry. Several entry rules were invest-
igated but none was shown to dominate the others.
However, in a previous study, Nof el al. (1978) concluded
that the initial entry rules do affect the system's perform-
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studied individually for developing efficient loading strat-
egies and dispatching rules.
In another study, Carrie and Petsopoulos (1985) con-
ducted a number of simulation experirncnts to assess the
effects of job sequencing and work balancing or unbalan-
cing in an existing FMS. Job sequencing was done in two
steps. Several launching (i.e. part-releasing) rules were
proposed and dispatching rules (FIFO and SI) were used
to select a part from the internal queue. The results led to
the conclusion that while there is potentially a significant
gain in system performance by increasing the flexibility
due to the allocation of operations to machines, none of
the other variables, including launching rules and queue
discipline, appear to have any significant effect on the
performance of the system of this FMS.
Schriber and Stecke (1986) provided an excellent simu-

ance in the long run. In allocating work to machines, the lation study of a dedicated FMS. The paper documented
SR, LR, FIFO and PR/TR dispatching rules were tested. various modelling parameters pertinent to a FMS simula-
The ratio rule (defined earlier) was found to be superior tion study, These parameters were further categorized by
than SR, LR and FIFO when the performance was Schriber and Stecke (1987) (see Table 4). The authors
measured in terms of production rate and machine successfully demonstrated the validity of the theoretical
utilization. However, it may be noted here that the results and further, conducted a variety of experiments to
classical statistical significance tests were not conducted to
validate the conclusions. Moreover, it is not clear how
their model handled the tool loading problem. Since four
alternative routes were assumed for each part type, it may Table 4. Factors for FMS simulation models.
be safe to infer that all machines were loaded with the
t. FMS configuration
required tools. In other words, the tooling did not present
Dedicated FMS
a bottleneck. Finally, no part entry rules or dispatching Random FMS
rules emphasizing due date related criterion were con-
2. Secondary FMS resources
sidered.
Number of:
A subsequent study dealing with the effectiveness of Buffers spaces-internal/or central
dispatching rules in an FMS environment was published Pallets and fixtures
by Stecke and Solberg (1981 a). In their scheduling Loading/unloading station
procedure, each operation was assigned to an individual 3. Geometric considerations
machine tooled to perform that task, thereby creating a Location of:
fixed routeing for each part. In their testing of loading Loadingjunloading stations
Machining centres
strategies and dispatching rules, they created alternate
Alternative routcings
routeings by assuming increased tooling flexibility. In
4. Secondary time requirements
total, five loading strategies were tested against 16 dis-
Transfer times
patching rules. For all loading strategies the dispatching Palletizingjdepalletizing
rule, SPT!TOT, performed best. For the specific Fixturing, dcfixturingjrefixruring
dedicated FMS, SI alone performed worse than the
5. Operating procedures
average rule. A loading strategy where all machines of a Buffer capacities
kind were pooled together, in combination with the Sequencing rules
dispatching rule SPT!TOT produced the overall Part input sequence
maximum output in the 80 simulation combinations 6. Operating discontinuties
compared. Although the classical statistical significance Machine/tool breakdowns
tests were not conducted to validate the conclusions, the Scheduled maintenance
results were compared with those of real system and Machine substitution
significant improvements were observed. These results 7. Secondary job characteristics
were 8-24% better than those obtained with the plant'S Due dates
Precedence constraints
existing scheduling rules. One important observation
Fisturingfrefixturing requirements
made by the authors was that each system should be
 368 Y. P. Gupta et al.
test the sensitivity of parameters such as the number of
AGVs, the number of buffers and the level of WIP. The
dispatching rule employed was SPT. The study provided
a complete and detailed explanation of the statistical
aspects of the results and thus, confirmed the validity of
the results.
Based on the analysis of results, some of the conclusions
derived by Schriber and Stecke (1986) are as follows: (a)
when balanced FMS production ratios are used, machine
utilizations, production rates, and system residence times
vary signilicantly with the level ofWIP and the number of
AGVs used to transport WIP; (b) machine utilization and
production rates increase more rapidly with increasing
levels of WIP than with increasing numbers of AGVs;
and (c) mean residence time and its viability tend to
decrease somewhat as the number of AGVs increases,
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and increase noticeably as the level of WIP increases.
The problem of tool allocation was not addressed by
Schriber and Stecke (1986), it may be assumed that all the
machines in a particular group (for example, two drills)
were loaded with the tools required to operate on all part
types (i.e. tooling flexibility). An analysis of the results
obtained for the two major performance measures
(machine utilization and production rate) seemed to have
a linear relationship with each other in all the experiments
conducted. The number of other dispatching rules
addressing due date related performance measures may
be further investigated.
Schriber and Stecke (1987) further extended their
previous study and provided a comparison of FIFO and
SPT scheduling rules. However, the major focus of this
study was to demonstrate the intimate relationship
between mathematical programming and simulation
approaches to the production planning and scheduling
problems of FMSs. It was shown that since the math-
crnatical programming approach provided a solution in
an aggregate sense (i.e. secondary resources, job char-
acteristics and palleting and fixturing considerations are
ignorcd), the simulation modelling should be used as a
second step while analysing the machine utilizations at
the disaggregate level. The authors provided a com-
prehensive analysis with respect to machine utilization
and production rate performance measures while using
simple scheduling rules. Again, it would be a worthwhile
attempt to extend their study to incorporate due date
related performance measures and dispatching rules.
Wang (1986) examined a complex FMS where several
factors (such as machine group configurations, material
handling systems (M H S) and demand fluctuations) sim-
ultaneously affect the system's performance. The experi-
ments with different combinations of settings were
analysed using the various statistical models (one-way
analysis of variance, multi-factor analysis of variance and
multiple regression analysis). It was concluded that the
machine group configuration had a significant impact on
system performance and that MHS had a moderate
impact, but that the demand fluctuations had no impact
on the system's output. However, no consideration was
given to the selection of appropriate dispatching rules.
Thus it seems that further investigations should be car-
ried out to derive some conclusions.
Choi and Malstrom (1988) analysed an actual FMS
using physical simulation. The performance of seven part
selection rules and four machine centre selection rules was
investigated. The combination of SPT and WINQ (SPT
rule as the part selection rule and WINQ as the machine
selection rule) performed well. Each part type was
assumed to require two operations. Each part type
required to visit the lathe cell for the first operation and
the second operation could be performed by any of the six
machine centres. Several machine selection rules were
tested. It is not clear whether the results could be
generalized to cases where more than two operations
needed to be performed on the part type (a more realistic
situation). However, this paper provided a new modelling
approach using a physical simulator (discussed later).
6.2. Results related to the machine/or system utilization criteria
Bell and Bilalis (1982) suggested five order release rules
and tested their performance using FIFO, SI and RI
dispatching rules against five different configurations of
the systems. No machine breakdown was assumed. Their
conclusion was that the combination of SI with all the
order release rules showed a considerable improvement in
system utilization. The results presented in the study
appeared to correspond to a single simulation run for
each combination. They did not provide any statistical
validation of the results. The authors suggested that
though the conclusions were drawn using a simple hypo-
thetical FMS, similar trends were observed on a larger
and more complex system. "
Kimemia and Gershwin (1983) developed a multilevel
hierarchical control algorithm for the control of produc-
tion in an automated manufacturing system with unreli-
able machines. They divided the control into a hierarchy
consisting of a number of different levels. Each level was
characterized by the length of the planning horizon and
the kind of data required for the decision-making process.
In this study, an FMS control policy was proposed
whereby long-term production objectives were met by
loading the parts in a way that would not overload the
system or cause congestion. The proposed algorithm
involved a stochastic optimal control problem at the first
level. The computational scheme was verified using simu-
lation. The simulation model consisted of two stations
with two machines in each station and an internal buffer
 Scheduling rules in FMSs
with a capacity of five pieces. At each station's internal
buffer the LIFO dispatching rule was employed. High
machine utilization rates were recorded for station A but
only medium machine utilization rates at station B. The
explanation for such differences between the two stations
was that the system tended to develop a bottleneck at
station A. No efforts were directed in testing some other
dispatching rules because the purpose of their present
study was to propose a control methodology for the
short-term production planning which explicitly takes
repair and failure into account. We shall elaborate on this
hierarchical approach in the next section on industrial
scheduling practices.
Dar-El and Sarin (1986) and Sarin and Dar EI (1986)
developed a heuristic procedure for scheduling parts
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using WINQ dispatching rule. Their heuristic resulted in
fairly high levels of machine utilization. The authors
suggested that sophisticated modifications of the
algorithm would result in even higher machine utilization
levels. The study did not address how the tool allocation
problem was solved (i.e. whether both machines in each
of the three groups were allocated the same tools).
Machine breakdowns were not considered. The proposed
approach seems to become more cumbersome in finding a
schedule, when machine breakdowns were considered (a
more realistic situation). Rachamadugu and Stecke
(1988) provided a review of this study in more detail.
Lin and Lu (1984) proposed two heuristics for machine
loading with the following objective functions: (a) bal-
ance workload (BWL), and (b) balance workload and
minimum number of late jobs (BWL-MNLJ). The load-
ing algorithms were solved for only one time period (say,
one shift of 8 h). The loaded jobs were scheduled on the
system using various scheduling rules. The authors col-
lected the statistics for the selected time periods. These
loading algorithms along with other commonly used
strategies such as 'earliest due date' (EDD) and 'first
come first served' (FCFS) were tested against SI, FIFO,
and a global dispatching rule, WINQ. Using the variance
of machine utilization as the performance measure, the
BWL policy performed better than the FCFS policy.
When due dates were employed, the BWL-MNLJ policy
performed better than the EDD policy when FIFO
dispatching rule was employed. In the case of SI and
WINQrules, the effect of the BWL-MNLJ policy was not
obvious. It was concluded that the system's performance
with respect to any of the loading policies had improved
significantly by using the global rule WINQ. It may be
noticed that the paper did not provide any details with
respect to the statistical validity of the results obtained
except that ten production runs were simulated. From the
proposed approach, it was not clear how the situation was
handled after the selected time period was over (i.e.
loading in the next time period). Moreover, the validity
369
of the analysis based on the results obtained for only one
shift still needs to be examined carefully. It may be
interesting to extend the proposed loading algorithms to
take the subsequent periods into consideration. Also, the
implications of incorporating machine breakdowns in the
heuristic provides another possible direction for future
research efforts.
Shanker and Tzen (1985) formulated five loading
strategies: two strategies based on the results of the
optimization model, two based on heuristics and one
based on random loading. However, they tested only two
strategies, i.e. random loading and balancing the work
load (a heuristic algorithm) against four dispatching rules
FIFO, SI, LI and MOPNR to obtain the best system
performance for a random FMS. It may be noted here
that their heuristic algorithms are strikingly similar to the
ones proposed by Lin and Lu (1984). The results of the
simulation model revealed that balancing the work load
provided better average machine utilization, no matter
which dispatching rule was followed. Because of the
limited number of simulation runs, no final results about
the efficiency of the dispatching rules were provided.
However, based on the initial runs, it was concluded that
the LI priority rule worked least well. The MOPNR rule
performed best for L3, i.e. when the system had a better
workload balance. However, the SI rule performed best
on average. Again, the statistical validation of the results
was not provided and a number of possible extensions are
discussed in the critical study of Lin and Lu (for more
detailed comments on this study, see Rachamadugu and
Stecke (1988».
Denzler and Boe (1987 a,b) tested the effectiveness of
scheduling heuristics developed for an existing dedicated
FMS. The scheduling of parts, carts, and machines was
controlled by software package which consisted of three
decision rules: (a) part load rule; (b) part launch rule; (c)
part routeing rule. Their heuristic scheduling approach
proposed two types of part loading rules (three order file
oriented rules and three system/machine oriented rules),
one launching rule (36 pallets availability), and one
routeing rule, WINQ.
The performance was tested using various experimen-
tal factors such as the number of pallets and machine
flexibility. The objective was to investigate which of the
part loading rules would perform best in scheduling the
FMS when it is subjected to different conditions of pallet
availability and machine flexibility. The statistical anal-
ysis of the simulation results was performed. Some of the
conclusions derived by the authors were as follows: (a)
two part loading rules ((i) SPJL, i.e. load the part which
has the smallest proportion of job launched, and (ii) NEP,
i.e. as each pallet is unloaded, reload it with a like
product, if possible) gave the highest utilization rates; (b)
machine flexibility was a significant experimental factor;
 :170 Y. P. Gupta et al.
(e) the number of pallets was not a significant experimen-
tal factor; and (d) the order file oriented loading rules did
not appear better or worse than the system oriented rules.
The authors pointed out that the part loading rule that
Stucke and Solberg (1981 a) reported as performing best
in their study did not perform as well as NEP and SPJL.
However, it may be noted that the performance measures
in these two studies were different. Stecke and Solberg
considered the production rate where as in this study,
the performance measure was machine utilization. In
general, however, there seems to be a linear relationship
between these two measures (see, for example, Schriber
and Stocke (1986)), and if this is true then we may
compare the above two studies.
The above analysis was performed under the assump-
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tion of certainty, i.c. no machine breakdowns or failures
or carts etc. was allowed at the shop floor level. In Denzler
and Hoc (1987 b), the former study was extended to
include uncertainty factors. A complete statistical test was
performed by thc authors. Again, NEP and SPJL main-
tained their superiority over other part loading rules. The
results did not show a significant decrease in the machine
utilization rate other than that caused by the direct
reduction in net system capacity caused by machine
breakdowns. Although the above study provides an
extensive and complete analysis of the scheduling pro-
cedures employed in an existing FMS, some issues that
were not addressed by the study but which could be of
interest in general arc: (a) it does not explain how the
part type selection, tool allocation and part mix ratio
problems were addressed, and how analysis of the effects
of the solutions to these problems on proposed scheduling
procedures would be of interest; and (b) the machine
grouping problem was not addressed (specifically, in the
second study where machine breakdown was considered)
and it would be interesting to analyse the effects of
grouping heuristics on system performance. Since the
above study was performed on an existing FMS, we may
usc the idea of logical machine groupings as suggested by
Srcckc (1983).
6.3. Results related to throughput/or }low times criteria
Iwata et al, (1982) considered the problem of determin-
ing the schedules for machining and transporting parts,
and for transporting cutting tools simultaneously so as to
minimize the makespan of production. The model cap-
lures most of the features pertaining to an FMS. A
heuristic procedure based on three decision rules (i.e.
SOTA, ESTA and EFTA) was developed. To investigate
the effects of these rules, computational experiments were
carried out. Four kinds of scheduling performance were
examined, i.e. makespan, mean flow time, mean utiliza-
tion of machine tools and carts. It was concluded that the
combination of the ESTA rule for the selection of
machine tools and transport devices yielded the
maximum values of mean utilization of the machine tools
and transport devices, and that the combination of the
EFTA rule for the selection of machine tool and transport
devices yielded the minimum values of the makes pan as
well as mean Oow time. The paper did not provide details
of the computational approach or statistical validation of
the results, and the machine breakdowns were also not
considered. Overall, the results from the proposed model
provided a useful insight into FMS scheduling. Although
a large number of studies have been conducted in the
recent past, it is surprising that no further studies were
reported on the same line.
Chang et al. (1984) proposed a two-phase approximate
method that incorporated global information for on-line
scheduling of FMSs. The proposed algorithm was com-
pared with SI, LT, FIFO, MOPNR and FOPNR. From
the experiments it was observed that: (a) the two-phase
approximate method outperformed the tested dispatching
rules in terms of throughput and mean Oow times (in fact,
it resulted in a 39% increase in throughput over the next
best rule); and (b) the rule SI was slightly better than the
other rules in terms of throughput. However, the disper-
sion of mean flow time for various part types was high
for Sf. FIFO yielded the most uniform throughput
among part types (for more detailed comments, see
Rachamadugu and Stecke (1988)).
Vaithianathan (1982) developed loading scheme based
on the concepts of group technology. Similarity measures
and clustering were used to produce subgroups of jobs
that resulted in level loads on all the machines (taking
capacity constraints into consideration). Once the sub-
groups were obtained, several rules such as SI, HGST,
SGST, S-2, RSTPI and HMS were employed to test the
performance of the loading scheme. The scheme when
tested for lower throughput times against SI, HGST,
SGST, S-2, RSTPI and HMS, showed that all dispatch-
ing rules performed better than Sf. However, a detailed
analysis with respect to ranking the remaining rules was
not provided. Also, no statistical tests were reported in
the study. As mentioned by the author, in order success-
fully to implement this algorithm to obtain a balanced
load, the original set of orders to be scheduled must be
large and diverse. The proposed approach gave no
consideration to due date related measures.
Recently, Chan and Pak (1986) proposed two heuristic
algorithms (HI and H2) for the FMS scheduling problem.
For the due date related problem, the heuristics were used
to obtain a schedule such that the respective due dates
were met or, failing this, the cost of tardiness was
minimized. For the makespan and average lead time
 Scheduling rules in FMSs
related problems, the algorithms found an optimal due
date for each job. The authors showed the effectiveness of
the algorithms using a numerical example of job shop
adapted from Nicholson and Pullen (1971).
The simulation results showed that the proposed heur-
istics outperformed the other scheduling rules, namely
FIFO and SI. In the case of a dynamically loaded FMS,
the proposed heuristics were accordingly modified to
adjust for due date. The conclusion was that the perform-
ance of HI, when it is fully or partially adjusted for due
dates, ranked highest among all scheduling rules tested.
The study neither mentioned how the tool allocation
problem was addressed nor was a statistical analysis
performed to validate the application of heuristics in FMS
environment. Moreover, no computational experience
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was reported in the paper. Thus, for practical purposes, it
was not clear how the results could be used in an
integrated production and scheduling problem.
Han et al. (1989) presented a different but related tool
loading and job dispatching problem. In this problem, a
part visits only one of the machining centres for its
complete processing. The initial assignment of the tools
was made optimally and then, as a real-time control, the
tools which were required by a machine but not present,
were borrowed either from another machine if not in use
or from the tool crib if available. The authors argued
about the practicality of such an approach in the defence
industry in which small-size, high-precision metal parts
are produced. The throughput performance measure was
to minimize the tool movement at prescribed workload
imbalances at the machining centres.
A non-linear integer programming model was
developed to load the tools and parts simultaneously. In
order to solve the computationally difficult problem, they
proposed an optimization-based approximate solution
method which resulted in two problems, i.e. part loading
and tool loading. Next, these two problems were solved
iteratively. A greedy heuristic rule was also proposed and
the performance was compared. Based on the analysis of
two problem sets, the optimization-based method reduced
the number of times tools were borrowed. However, the
computation time also increased sharply as the problem
size increased. Using the results from the tool loading
problem, a computer simulation was performed to ana-
lyse various other issues such as the impact of: (a) various
factors of workload imbalance; (b) central queue versus
individual queues; (c) various queue disciplines LPT,
MTM, SPT, RAN; (d) returning borrowed tools to the
tool crib immediately after their use or when there is a
request for them in another machine. Based on the
experimental results, the heuristic tool-loading method
with the 'no tool-return unless requested' policy was
recommended, together with any dispatching rule. As a
possible extension, it would be interesting to modify the
371
proposed heuristic to incorporate both of the conflicting
objectives, i.e. minimize the tool movement and balance
the workload. Further, rigorous statistical tests (such as
factorial designs) should be performed to validate the
results.
Slomp et al. (1988) proposed three quasi on-line sched-
uling procedures for FMSs consisting of machining
centres (WS), transport devices (TD) and operators. The
procedures are based on an activity-model and are imple-
mented by executing four distinguished functions: (a)
choosing a WS upon which one or more processing stages
might be executed; (b) selecting a TD for the transport
activities of an operation; (c) assigning an operator to one
or more activities of an operation; and (d) determining
which operation must be placed in the scheduling
sequence next. The three procedures called Function
Sequential Scheduling (FSS), Function Integrated Sched-
uling (FIS), and Function Phased Scheduling (FPS),
differed in the way the four abovementioned functions
were handled hierarchically.
The performance of the procedures were compared
against a number of scheduling rules (such as SPT,
SPT.TOT, SPT!TOT and EFTA) using computer simu-
lation. The system performance is presented by means of
makespan and mean flow time. They concluded that the
FPS procedure was inferior as compared to others. While
the SPT!TOT performed better on makespan measure, it
performed worst on the mean flow time measure of
performance. This paper presented a different approach
to the FMS scheduling problem. The case study consisted
of a rather small FMS and it is not clear how the part type
selection problem was addressed. For example, no justif-
cation was given for selecting the particular part input
ratio and no simulation was performed to test its effect
on the system performance. Further, the paper did not
address the tool loading problem. For example, while
implementing the scheduling procedures on more realistic
systems, is it practical to assume that all the machining
centres have the tools required to perform all the required
operations? The conclusions derived did not appear to be
justified. For example, the paper did not explain why the
SPT!TOT provided opposite results for the two measures
considered in the paper. Also, comparison of the results
with the study of Stecke and Solberg (1981) does not seem
appropriate since the measures of performance con-
sidered are different.
6. 4. Results related to due dale
6. 4.1. Mean tardiness
Raman el al. (1986) concluded that an increase In the
 372 Y. P. Gupta et al.
relative imbalance of machine workloads led to a deterior-
ation in mean tardiness when the MOD dispatching rule
was employed. They also formulated two more rules, (a)
MOD/M DO; and (b) CRITICAL and tested their per-
formance. The preliminary investigations indicated that
both rules outperformed the MOD rule for mean tar-
diness. They also concluded that an increase in the
relative imbalance of machine workloads leads to a
deterioration in the mean flow time when the MOD rule
was employed.
Kiran and Alptekin (1985) proposed an algorithm in an
attempt to minimize tardiness. However, no experimen-
tal results were reported in the study. It was claimed that
the algorithm was flexible enough to incorporate other
scheduling criteria and more general cases.
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6.4.2. Maximum tardiness
Pourbabai (1986) proposed a branch and bound
algorithm to minimize the maximum tardiness such that
the production of each job type equalled its demand. For
loading the batch of jobs in appropriate work stations,
pre-specified dispatching rules such as DD and EAT were
incorporated in the model. By assuming that all the jobs
arc available at zero time and that the set up times could
be neglected, a mixed binary linear programming form-
ulation was suggested and a number of algorithms were
provided to solve the model. However, no illustrative
example was solved and no computational experience
with the approach was reported.
7. Industrial scheduling practices
McKay et al. (1988) argued that the theoretical
approach of operations research to scheduling often was
not appl icable to the dynamic characteristics of an actual
situation. From an informal survey on scheduling prac-
tices of 40 schedulers and meetings with several manufac-
turing consultants, the authors concluded that the
theoretical formulations of the problem may be irrelevant
as they did not capture the essence of the scheduling
problem faced by schedulers, and the results had little
applied value.
Although the above criticisms were related to job-shop
scheduling, the conclusions so derived appear equally
valid for FMS scheduling practices. In the present study,
we observed that most of the research studies were
conducted using a hypothetical FMS under various
assumptions, thereby, making it almost impossible to
derive fruitful conclusions which could be used for prac-
tical purposes. The situation was supported by a survey
conducted by Smith et al. (1986) of actual FMS sched-
uling practices. They concluded that the literature did not
correspond to the needs of the practioners.
In this section, we will summarize some of the con-
clusions and findings from case studies of real life FMSs.
The choice of applicable loading and scheduling strat-
egies depends on many system-specific variables (Stecke
and Solberg 1981 a). Which combiantion of loading and
dispatching strategies might be best is highly system
dependent. Denzler and Boe (1987 a) observed that the
part loading rule that Stecke and Solberg (1981 a)
reported as performing best did not perform as well in
the system they studied. Since the system simulated by
Denzler and Boe was significantly different from the one
simulated by Stecke and Solberg, the differing results
imply that the loading strategies and the appropriate
dispatching rules should be tailored for each type of
flexible manufacturing system. Moreover not all
researchers have tested all the rules on a given FMS.
Thus the literature does not provide baseline data to
compare the performance of various scheduling rules
even if the type of system can be controlled. In conclusion
it can be said that the literature on scheduling rules in a
FMS is in a state of confusion because of the lack of
uniform assumptions, structure and other system char-
acteristics. It would be extremely useful to test all the
rules discussed in this paper on a given system and then
study how the performance of these rules vary with
respect to various factors such as systems characteristics
and loading strategies.
A relatively new analysis method, a physical simulator,
has been proposed to assess the performance of an FMS
under various scheduling rules (Diesch and Malstrom,
Choi and Malstrom 1988, Choi et al. 1987). To quote
Diesch and Malstrom:
A physical simulator is an operational scale model of the
actual system. When controlled by a computer, a physical
simulator can be used to obtain operational data from the
system. These data may· then be used as an aid in the
design, installation and operation of the actual system.
A detailed physical simulator, constructed in 1982 at
Iowa State University, was designed to simulate the
operation of an automated flexible manufacturing system
currently being installed by a midwestern manufacturing
facility (described earlier). Actual data from this facility
were used both in the construction of the model and in
specifying its simulation parameters. The authors invest-
igated seven part type selection rules (i.e. part entry rule)
and four machine centre selection rules against six
different performance criteria. As mentioned earlier, the
FMS configuration assumed that there are two operations
needed to be performed. The first operation must be
performed on a lathe cell and the second operation can be
performed by anyone of the six machining centres. For
 Scheduling rules in FMSs
this configuration, the SLACK/WINQ and SPT/WINQ
rule sets dominated all the decision rule sets. The
SLACK/WINQ rule set showed superior performance
when WIP inventory was the criteria and the
SPT/WINQ rule set showed superior performance when
throughput time and actual production output were
considered. The authors conjectured that the results
obtained using the physical simulator may be extended to
other FMS configurations since the SPT, DDATE and
SLACK rules have been found to perform well for a
variety of different job shop configurations. It would be
interesting to validate the aforementioned conjecture.
Avonts et al. (1989) addressed an interesting real-life
production scheduling problem. Most of the literature on
FMS production planning and scheduling problems
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assumed FMS as the only production system in a given
facility and provided scheduling techniques for that
system. In practice, however, the FMS may be competing
with a conventional system (CS), i.e. when a firm is in the
process of installing an FMS. Avonts et al. argued that
there may be a subset of the product types which can be
manufactured in different way (such as FMS or CS). The
problem is then to decide which product types and what
quantities ought to be produced by the FMS.
The authors used linear programming (LP) to solve the
problem of allocating the products to FMS and CS. The
LP models were proposed and solved while considering
various objective functions such as inventory costs, pro-
duction costs, setup costs, total costs and system utiliza-
tion. The LP models contained only essential trade-offs
and the fixture and pallet constraints, tool magazine
constraints, etc. were relaxed. The authors claimed that
the LP models were accepted by the company as a
planning tool because of their simplicity. However, in
order to test the validity of the models, detailed simula-
tions were conducted by including all the constraints. The
LP results when compared with simulations, provided
good approximation. They observed that the differences
in the results were due to the constraints as well as the
operating rules (e.g. the sequence in which the parts were
entered into the FMS, the priority rules at each machine,
the operating rules for carriers, etc.). Thus, the simul-
ation model may be used to investigate the feasibility of
the solution derived from the LP. Overall, the authors
claimed that the company was satisfied with the results
from the simple LP models. However, for complex cases,
more sophisticated models such as multi-objective linear
programming models could be used.
According to Gershwin et al. (1984):
while the technology of manufacturing is improving
rapidly, a basic understanding of the systems issue remain
incomplete. These issues include production planning,
scheduling and control of work-in-process. They are
complicated by randomness in the manufacturing
373
environment (particularly due to machine failures and
uncertainty and variability in production requirements),
large data requirements, multiple level hierarchies, and
other issues ..
The authors argued that the optimization of such large
scale systems is impossible and suboptimal strategies for
planning based on hierarchical decomposition may be
developed and used for practical purposes (Gershwin et al.
1984 a, b, 1985). They proposed a new hierarchical pro-
duction scheduling policy for failure-prone FMSs. The
approach incorporated both machine status and demand
deviation feedback. The scheduling decisions would be
determined on-line based on the current status of each
machine in the system and the current difference between
production and demand. The parts would be loaded into
the system at rates that are constrained by the current
capacity (for details, refer to Gershwin et al.
(1984a, b, 1985). The approach was validated using a
simulation model of the real-life system at IBM's General
Productions Division at Tucson, an automated card
assembly line. The authors claimed that the policy can be
very effective in scheduling FMS.
8. Future research
Tables 2, 3 and 5 show that researchers have given
more importance to machine utilization and production
rate criteria in determining optimal solutions for FMS
scheduling. On the other hand, due date related criteria
seem to be more important to practitioners. Therefore, it
would be useful to direct more research efforts to the
development of scheduling strategies using due date
related criteria.
Table 6 shows that the majority of the dispatching rules
used in flexible manufacturing systems are local dispatch-
ing rules in both static and dynamic categories. Very little
work has been done in developing and testing global
dispatching rules in either of the two categories. It would
be useful to undertake studies in this direction.
A recent study of a job shop (Russel et al. 1987)
Table 5. Scheduling criteria (ranking of FMS operators)
(adapted from Smith tl al. (1986)).
Rank Criteria Points
1 Meeting the due date 57
2 Maximizing system/machine utilization 44
3. Minimizing in-process inventory 23
4 Maximizing-production rate 13
5 Minimizing setup time and tool change 13
6 Minimizing mean flow time 8
7 Balancing machine usage 3
 374 Y. P. Gupta et al.
Table 6. Relationship among dispatching rules.
Static
Local
Shortest imminent processing time
Longest imminent processing time
First in first out
First in last our
Random selection
Earliest due date
Static slack
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Global
concluded that the performance of the COVERT rule
(i.c, prioritize jobs in a queue according to the largest
rat io of expected job tardiness to operation processing
times) for a variety of tardiness measures excels when
compared to S-I, S-2, MOD and other dispatching rules.
Since COVERT is a global rule, it might be useful to test
its performance in an FMS environment.
Denzler and Boe (1987 c) argued that a number of the
job shop results can be applied in studying random
FMSs. Panwalker and Iskander (1977) and Blackstone
et al. (1982) provided an extensive review of dispatching
rules used in a job shop. Therefore, it may be worthwhile
to test some of these rules in FMSs and validate the claims
made by Denzler and Boe.
Conway (1965) found that the performance of all rules
related to mean lateness and number of tardy jobs were
somewhat sensitive to the method of due date establish-
ment. An analysis of due date management problems in a
FM S scheduling environment reveals that while a variety
of sophisticated decision rules have been suggested to
assign due date (sec Table 7), not much attention has
been paid to the selection of such rules. In the literature,
the most widely used due date assignment rule is TWK
(c.g. Shanker and Tzen 1985, Choi et at. 1987).
An analysis of the recent simulation studies (e.g.
Ragatz and Mabert 1984) of due date assignment rules
reveals that: (a) job characteristic and shop status
information should be used to develop due date assign-
ment rules; (b) the dispatching rule used to sequence jobs
Dynamic
Shortest remaining processing time
Largest remaining processing time
Fewest operations remaining
Most operations remaining
Greatest setup time
Modified due date
Modified operation due date
Shortest processing time/total operation time
Shortest processing time x total operation time
Largest processing time/total operation time
Largest processing time x total operation time
Earliest available time
Least amount of slack
Least ratio of job slack to remaining
processing time
PR!TR
CRITICAL
WINQ
MOD!MDD
SMCPT
NINQ
at work centres influences shop performance; and (c)
information about work centre congestion along a job's
routeing is more useful information than general shop
conditions. Some of the best due date assignment pro-
cedures are summarized in Table 4. It may be worthwhile
Table 7. Due dale assignment rules (for details refer to Ragatz
and Mabert (1984)).
I. Exogenous
The due dates are fixed and given an attribute of a job.
Two methods under this category are:
CON: all jobs are given exactly the same Oow allowance
RAN: the flow allowance for a job is randomly assigned
2. Endogenous
The due dates are set internally as the job arrives on the
basis of:
Job characteristics (such as arrival times, and processing
times)
TWK: due dates are based on total work content
SLK: jobs are given flow allowance that reflects equal
slack or waiting time
Nap: due dates are determined on the basis of
number of operations to be performed on each job
Shop status information (such as queue length)
JIQ: due dates are determined based on current
queue lengths in system
JIS: due dates are determined based on information
on number of jobs in system
PPW: due dates are determined based on information
on waiting time in system
 Scheduling rules in FMSs
investigating the impact of the above fmdings on the
performance of a flexible manufacturing system.
Finally, we observed that most of the simulation studies
performed by researchers were on hypothetical FMSs.
To make it worse, no two papers considered the same
configurations. Thus, it would be highly desirable to
perform simulation studies in a way that further investi-
gations could be performed successfully in the future. For
this purpose, we suggest that researchers should consider
various factors as suggested by Schriber and Stecke and
are tabulated in Table 4. The use of this table as a
checklist would be helpful to derive the conclusions and
use the results in real life situations.
9. Summary
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In this paper, we have classified the dispatching rules
employed in FMS scheduling and attempted to explain
the general idea behind different rules and develop a
framework to guide future research efforts in this direc-
tion (Tables 2,3,6). We tried to analyse the results of
various researchers and found that the task was quite a
formidable one, for several reasons: (a) a variety of
hypothetical as well as real system configurations had to
be considered; and (b) the combination of various loading
strategies and dispatching rules applied in the studies
gave system specific results. Thus the literature does not
provide baseline data to compare the performance of
various scheduling rules. It also appears that the choice of
scheduling rules is dependent upon the operating char-
acteristics of the system such as variations in processing
times. It is concluded that the literature on scheduling
rules in FMS is in a state of confusion because of the lack
of uniform assumptions, structure and other system
characteristics. It would be extremely useful to test all the
rules discussed in this paper on a given system and then
study how the performance of these rules vary with
respect to various factors such as systems characteristics
and loading strategies.
Acknowledgement
We acknowledge the constructive comments made by
the referees on the earlier version of this manuscript.
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