Operational decisions for minimization of penalty cost in non‐pre‐emptive FMS

Minimizing penalty cost is one of the major objectives in FMS decision making when job‐due dates cannot be met. The study focuses on minimization of penalty cost when neither increase in system capacity nor diversification of jobs to other plants or production lines is possible. A mathematical programming model combining both part type selection and scheduling decision making is proposed for small problems. For large problems, a simple control parameter is identified. Seven despatching rules are applied in conjunction with the control parameter and their differences in performance are reported. Not only proves that performance can be improved by a filtration process applied before despatching rules are applied, but also finds that there is no significant difference in performance between different despatching rules after the appropriate filtration process is applied. The effectiveness of the proposed control parameter is further illustrated by comparing the results with a continuous flow model.