Enabling the identification of multi-product assembly system architectures – a new method and its application in the automotive industry

Abstract

Product variety, in combination with today's unstable market environment, brings strong challenges to manufacturing firms. Singleproduct assembly systems become difficult to implement as the return on investment is difficult to obtain with decreasing lot sizes and unstable customer demands. Multi-product assembly systems are a possible solution to this problem, as they allow to compensate demand fluctuations throughout the product mix. However, variety is a strong barrier to this kind of production systems. A new method is presented in this paper to identify multi-product assembly system architectures adapted to a product family, based on the identification of components for common positioning. This method has been applied to a supplier in the automotive industry and a return of experience of this case study is provided, highlighting its potentials and barriers.