Multiple Part Type Cyclic Flow Shop Robotic Cell Scheduling Problem; A Novel and Comprehensive Mixed Integer Programming Approach

This paper deals with the cyclic flow shop robotic cell scheduling problem with multiple single and dual gripper robots, in which multiple part types are processed on multiple machines successively with free, time-windows and no-wait pickup criteria. The robots execute the transportation of parts between the machines. A novel comprehensive mixed-integer linear programming model has been proposed for this problem. The proposed model simultaneously determines the optimal sequence of multiple parts for the cyclic schedule and the optimal sequencing of the robots moves, which in return maximizes the throughput rate. The validity of the proposed model is examined by a computational study on the instance problem and solved using GUROBI Optimizer. The analysis on the test problems effectively demonstrated the affects of dual gripper option and the collision constraints.