A multi-domain model for product and manufacturing system design

This paper is presenting a novel multi-domain clustering model that is simultaneously applied in the manufacturing system design and product design domains. The synthesis process of a manufacturing system depends on the needed machines to produce the required products. The increase in product variety led to the emergences of cellular manufacturing, in which machines are bundled into cells based on similar processes. Incidence Matrix (IM) is the main used tool to produce machine cells. IM is commonly represented by a binary matrix that reveals the dependency of different product components on the corresponding machines. In addition, product variety has also led to the introduction of modularity in product design. A module can be defined as a group of product components, which are strongly connected internally, while weakly connected externally. Design Structure Matrix (DSM) is the main used tool for modularity. A DSM is commonly a square binary matrix, which illustrates the interactions between different product components. Clustering is the mathematical technique that is used in both IM and DSM to construct manufacturing cells and product modules. Many models exist for clustering the IM and DSM matrices individually. However, a model that clusters them simultaneously is lacking. Such a model should be able to group different product components into modules, while arranging different machines into manufacturing cells considering those modules. Such a model is useful to reflect the design constraints of products on the results of manufacturing systems synthesis.