Shuttle-based storage and retrieval system (SBS/RS) is one of the automated warehouse system family. The system typically consists of static multi-level storage racks, carriers that carry Stock-keeping-units (SKU) in and out of the storage rack. There are two carriers in this system, one called lift, carrying SKU from the point of entry to each tier of storage racks, and secondly, a shuttle carrier installed on each level of the storage rack to carry SKUs into and out of the storage compartment. This system claimed to have an efficient transaction rate as the number of carriers is more compared to the conventional crane-based storage system, just only one carrier for each aisle [1,2].The typical SBS/RS operation is quite simple. There are two principal transactions, to store the SKU into the storage rack and to retrieve the SKU from the storage rack. SBS/RS delivers the SKU through a carrier running between racking frameworks on a track. Furthermore, the carrier can operate at a level or can move to another rack level.
*Author for correspondenceThe carrier is powered by the battery and intelligent enough to know when to recharge it [3,4]. When an item is required, the carrier will drive to the place of the SKU and pick it up from the rack. When there is no transaction, the carrier park at its designed location or called dwell location [2,5]. Past research had suggested the dwell location for SBS/RS. The dwell location purposed was at the input/output point [6], at the Point-of-Service-Completion (POSC) [7], and in the middle of the rack. The motive to set a variety of carrier parking location is to have the optimal system throughput performance, that is the rate of transaction per hour [8].The study in this paper is part of a thorough study for both carriers, the lift and shuttle, dwell points for SBS/ RS systems. Past studies show almost no specific study on this carrier dwell point to study the overall performance of this SBS/RS system. The needs of this study are stated and highlighted by [3]. The objective is to identify the optimal carrier shuttle dwell point that minimizes the response time for the next retrieval transaction. This response time minimization will directly reflect on the overall system throughput performance.