Balancing modular transfer lines with serial–parallel activation of spindle heads at stations

Branch and bound algorithm for a transfer line design problem: Stations with sequentially activated multi-spindle heads

In this paper a new transfer line balancing problem is considered. The main difference from the simple assembly line balancing problem is that the operations are grouped into blocks. All the operations of the same block are carried out simultaneously by one piece of equipment (multi-spindle head). Nevertheless, the blocks assigned to the same workstation are executed in series. The line cost co...

Optimal Holding times at Transfer Stations

Most bus transit systems only offer direct service between a small fraction of the origin/destination pairs that they serve. As a consequence, many travelers must transfer between bus lines to complete their journey. In this paper schedule control policies are created to minimize transfer time under stochastic conditions. We determine how long a bus should be held at a transfer stop in anticipa...

A TIGHT BALANCING ACT: LEADERSHIP CHALLENGES FOR UNIVERSITY HEADS (Heads of School and Heads of Department)

This paper draws on the responses of 134 Heads of School and Heads of Department who were part of a larger study of 513 Australian higher education leaders. Heads of School / Department are at the centre of complex relational interfaces comprising faculty, students, central administration, and external entities and support agencies. While such experiences are not necessarily unique to Heads, th...

MIP-based GRASP and Genetic Algorithm for Balancing Transfer Lines

In this paper, we consider a problem of balancing transfer lines with multi-spindle machines. The problem has a number of distinct features in comparison with the well-studied Assembly Line Balancing Problem, such as parameterized operation times, non-strict precedence constraints, and parallel operations execution. We propose MIP-based greedy randomized adaptive search procedure (GRASP) and ge...

Transfer Stations and Synchronization