Assignment

Part 1

1. Please use one sentence to describe what ultimate goal Chapter 6 teaches you to achieve.

2. What are the from-to chart, the flow-between chart and the relation chart? How do they are related?

3. How to calculate the cost or score of the material flows for a facility layout in terms of the distance-based objective? How to use it as a criterion to judge whether a facility layout is efficient or not?

4. How to calculate the cost or score of the material flows for a facility layout in terms of the adjacency-based objective? How to use it as a criterion to judge whether a facility layout is efficient or not?

5. In an assembly plant, material handling between departments is performed using a uni­directional closed-loop conveyor. The figure below shows the layout for the modular facility, which consists of three equal-sized assembly modules (A, B, and C), one admin­istrative module (D), and one warehouse module (E). P/D points for each module are also shown in the figure.

The administrative and warehouse activities are not to be moved; however, assembly areas A, B, C can be relocated. The distance between P/D points and the number of pallet loads moved between departments are given below.

Using the pairwise exchange method, determine new locations for assembly modules A, B, and C that minimize the sum of the products of pallet flows and conveyor travel distances.

6. The ABC Cooling and Heating Company manufactures several different types of air con­ditioners. Five departments are involved in the processing required for the products. A summary of the processing sequences required for the five major products and the weekly production volumes for the products are shown in the tables below along with the depart­ment area. Based on the graph-based construction method, develop a block layout.

7. A manufacturing facility has six departments, A, B, C, D, E and F. The following table is the from-to flow matrix of material flows between the departments:

Assume that the costs for moving a unit load per a unit distance are the same for all the material exchanges between the departments. That is, all the cij values can be set to 1. By using CRAFT's iteration, three layout alternatives are generated, as shown below, where each grid measures 20' x 20'.

1) Please calculate the cost of material flows for each layout alternative.

2) Based on your calculated results, please judge which facility layout is the best one.

3) Please describe in details how CRAFT is used to generate an optimal facility layout.

Part 2

1. You are assigned to determine the total construction area for a warehouse. Overall, a warehouse consists of tow parts: an external dock area and an internal storage area.

a) When you design the dock area, what sections (sub-areas) do you need to consider and what impact their sizes?
b) When you design the storage area, what sections (sub-areas) do you need to consider and what impact their sizes?

2. When determining the size of the internal storage area, the first thing you need to decide is to select a storage method suitable for your need. There are two methods: randomized (or floating) storage and dedicated (for fixed) storage.

a) What are the randomized storage method and the dedicated storage methods?
b) What are the advantages and disadvantage of these two methods?

3. The proper arrangement of merchandise inside a warehouse plays a critical role at decreasing the travel time and distance to find an item, selling products more quickly and increasing customers' satisfaction. It needs to follow a few of general storage principles.

a) What is the principle of popularity? How does it impact the layout of storage area?
b) What is the principle of similarity? How does it impact the layout of storage area?
c) What is the principle of size? How does it impact the layout of storage area?