Effects of scatter plot initial solutions on regular grid facility layout algorithms in typical production models

Abstract

Two simulation experiments were conducted to verify whether the idea of virtual force scatter plot algorithm, used for searching solutions of the facility layout problems, may be used as an input to the classical CRAFT and simulated annealing (SA) algorithms. The proposed approach employs a regular grid for specifying possible locations of objects. Three independent variables were investigated in the first experiment, namely, (1) the size of the problem: 16, 36 and 64 objects, (2) the type of links between objects: grid, line, and loop, and (3) the shape of the possible places in which the objects can be situated: circle, row and square. The patterns of possible location places were also adapted to the analysis of examples taken from literature, included in the second experiment. The gathered data were statistically analyzed. The results shows substantial decrease in goal function means for all of the examined experimental conditions, if the proposed starting solutions are applied to the CRAFT algorithm. The application of the approach to SA is profitable in specific tasks. The presented comparative numerical results show, in which circumstances the proposed method is superior over various genetic algorithms and other hybrid approaches. Overall, the experimental data investigation demonstrates the usefulness of the proposed method and encourages further research in this direction.