Heuristic Algorithm for Solving Multi-Crane Scheduling in Steel Coil Warehouse

Abstract:

We consider a multi-crane scheduling problem commonly encountered in real warehouse operations in steel enterprises. Given some demanded coils, if a demanded coil is in upper level or in lower level without being blocked, it can be picked up directly to designated place; else, the blocking coils need to be picked up to another position first. Unlike previous literatures in which both operations have been considered to be scheduled separately, our problem schedules transportation operation and shuffling operation coordinately. The objective is to minimize the last demanded coil transported to its designated place which is consistent with the earliest possible completion time of one crane. We propose a heuristic algorithm for solving this demonstrated strongly NP-hard.

• Periodical: Applied Mechanics and Materials (Volumes 543-547)
• Pages: 1559-1562
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.4028/www.scientific.net/AMM.543-547.1559
• Online since: March 2014
• Authors: Xie Xie*, Xiang Yu Kong, Yong Yue Zheng, Yan Ping Li
• Keywords: Complexity Analysis, Coordinated Transportation and Shuffling Operations, Heuristics, Multi-Crane Scheduling, Warehouse, Worst Case

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