Effective movement of materials plays an important role in successful operation of any organization. Proper methods adopted for material movement are also crucial for the overall safety of the personnel involved in the manufacturing processes. Selection of the appropriate material handling equipment (MHE) is a vital task for improving productivity of an organization. In today's technological era, varieties of MHEs are available to carry out a desired task. Depending on the type of material to be moved, there are many quantitative and qualitative factors influencing the selection decision of a suitable MHE. The problem of selecting the right type of MHE for a given purpose can be solved using multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) methods which are capable of dealing with the combination of crisp and fuzzy data. In this paper, an MCDM method employing fuzzy axiomatic design principles is applied for selecting the most appropriate MHE for the given task. As a measure of suitability, the total information content is calculated for each MHE and the MHE alternative with the least total information content is regarded as the best choice. Two real time problems from the literature, i.e. selection of an automated guided vehicle, and selection of loading and hauling equipments in surface mines, are solved to validate the applicability, flexibility and potentiality of the adopted approach.

There has been a rapid growth in construction activities during the last few decades owing to overall development in all facets of humanity. Due to technological advancements and ever increasing civilization, there is a persistent need of energy. Along with the conventional energy sources, the renewable energy sources have also significantly contributed to the rising energy needs. As a renewable source of energy, numerous small hydro-power plants (SHPPs) have been built up across the world in the recent past. Usually these SHPPs are being built and operated by the private developers complying with the government regulations. In order to assist a developer in selecting the most profitable and feasible SHPP for construction and subsequent operation, a method based on fuzzy axiomatic design principles is employed in this paper. The techno-commercial and socioeconomic criteria as considered for analyzing the feasibility of the candidate SHPPs are expressed qualitatively using trapezoidal fuzzy numbers. The performance of each SHPP is evaluated in terms of its total information content and the one with the least information content is selected to be the best venture for the required construction activity. The adopted methodology is found to have immense potential to the developers while selecting the most feasible project for construction.

Since the last few decades, there have been tremendous technological advancements in communication, aeronautics, automobiles, textile engineering, nuclear energy, medical sciences and die-making industries. These have necessitated the use of some totally new and hitherto unknown high-strength temperature-resistant, tough and difficult-tomachine materials and, consequently, some newer unconventional processes for their efficient machining. It has been well established that non-traditional machining processes (NTMPs) far surpass their traditional counterparts in machining such advanced materials with respect to tolerance, surface finish, accuracy, complexity and miniatureness of the machined product/part. These NTMPs are also found to be more effective and economical. Choosing the most appropriate NTMP for generation of a desired shape feature on a given work material involves consideration of numerous conflicting qualitative and quantitative criteria. This paper proposes the application of fuzzy axiomatic design principles for selection of the most suitable NTMPs for generating cavities on ceramics and micro-holes on hardened tool steel and titanium materials, based on their practical/industrial importance. For micro-drilling operation on hardened tool steel, electrical discharge machining is found to be the best process followed by abrasive jet machining and ultrasonic machining. On the other hand, for generation of micro-holes on titanium, electrochemical machining is the most suitable process. Abrasive jet machining emerges out as the most efficient process for generating blind cavities on ceramics. These results are well in accordance with the expected machining practices and perfectly match with the decisions of the machining professionals.

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Overall competency of the working personnel is often observed to ultimately affect the productivity of an organization. The globalised competitive atmosphere coupled with technological improvements demands for efficient and specialized manpower for the industrial operations. A set of typical technological skills and attitudes is thus demanded for every job profile. Most often, these skills and attitudes are expressed imprecisely and hence, necessitating the support of fuzzy sets for their effective understanding and further processing. In this paper, a method based on fuzzy axiomatic design principles is applied for solving the personnel selection problems. Selecting a middle management staff of a service department for a large scale organization is demonstrated here as a real life example. Five shortlisted candidates are assessed with respect to a set of 18 evaluation criteria, and the selection committee with experts from the related fields also realizes the outcome of the adopted approach to be quite appropriate, befitting and in agreement with their expectations.