Evaluación y selección conjunta de la mejor regla de prioridad y política de lote de transferencia para las Pymes metalmecánicas por medio de la simulación de eventos discretos

Abstract

One of the challenges for scheduling operations in a company is the customer orders sequence. Choosing a proper transfer batch policy improves significantly the tasks sequence. A production environment where the number of operators are less than the number of operations, generating rotation between stations, is considered. The sequence and a proper transfer batch size policy has a significant impact on the company’s resources, productivity and the operations performance. In this context, a simulation model of discrete events is proposed (DES) in FlexSim to measure the impact of applying different priority rules and transfer batch policies on a small and medium-sized business (SME), dedicated to the manufacture and restoration of GLP cylinders. For the case of study, there is a continuous flow and a unitary transmission of products inside the stations, simplifying the problem. Only the products are in order at the entrance of the stations and transfer batches are given at the output of the work cells. Statistical analysis showed that the best priority rules for these production systems are those which consider the number of missing operations per order, such as the MOR and LOR rules. The combination of these rules with the unitary transfer of products increases on average by 13% the amount of finished products compared to the FIFO rule and full batch transfer method currently used by the company. The combinations also improve the rest of the seven performance measures proposed.