Supporting Production Planning by Production Process Simulation

An interactive production planning system for electronic industry is described. PCB component printing is used as a case study, but the method can be adapted to other similar environments of generalized flexible flow line. The system simulates the production from an initial situation to a given moment in the future. The input defines the product batches, their allocation and sequence for each machine and the due dates. The output includes summaries of the production period including the lateness of the batches and machine workload charts. The user can reconsider the allocation and sequencing of the batches and repeat the simulation and update operations to find a better balancing of the workload.