Advanced Materials Research Vol. 845

Abstract: Spool fabrication shop is an intermediate phase in the piping process for construction projects. The delivery of pipe spools at the right time in order to be installed in the site is very important. Therefore, effective scheduling and controlling of the fabrication shop has a direct effect on the productivity and successfulness of the whole construction projects. In this paper, a genetic algorithm (GA) is developed to create an active schedule for the operational level of pipe spool fabrication. In the proposed algorithm, an enhanced solution coding is used to suitably represent a schedule for the fabrication shop. The initial population is generated randomly in the initialization stage and precedence preserving order-based crossover (POX) and uniform crossover are used appropriately. In addition, different mutation operators are used. The proposed algorithm is applied with the collected data that consist of operations processing time from an industrial fabrication shop. The results showed that by using GA for scheduling the fabrication processes, the productivity of the spool fabrication shop has increased by 88 percent.

Abstract: Facility location-allocation problems have various applications in private and public sectors. A capacitated p-median problem is considered in this work which is computationally NP-Hard. The primary goal of this paper was to determine a set of p-facilities location in which all demand points are allocated and its average distance traveled from the customers’ location to the selected p-facilities is minimized. In addition, the model also considered supplier’s allocation for p facilities. A real world case study has been addressed, and genetic algorithm which consists of crossover and mutation operators was proposed in order to solve the problem. Computational results for different values of p were generated, and finally the optimum solution based on minimum cost was reported.

Abstract: Nowadays, through greater awareness of protecting the environment and sustainable development in organizations, the importance of recycling and returning of used product has increased in supply chain management. Selecting an appropriate recycler is a critical issue in an organization and it needs to trade off between multiple criteria. Selection criteria are related to organizational circumstances and they may be qualitative or quantitative with complexity and uncertainty in their nature. The purpose of this study is to determine the sustainability criteria for recycler selection and to suggest a fuzzy AHP model for choosing the best third party recycler. A comprehensive methodology is illustrated using a case study of a fast food restaurant chain in Malaysia.

Abstract: Sustainability has become new evolution of quality and efficiency indicator for product life cycle. It is generally acknowledge that sustainability is a result from balancing the environmental, economical and social aspect. However, each aspects may expand to different type of parameters involved that cross the system boundary; qualitative and quantitative parameters. Fuzzy logic approach will be applied to deal with the data uncertainty for obtaining the sustainability assessment of hollow fiber membrane module. Fuzzy logic operation will formulate the mapping from inputs to an output. Thus, it will able for intermediate assessment between sustainable and non-sustainable hollow fiber membrane module. Hence, this paper introduces the comprehensive method for assessing sustainability as guide for hollow fiber membrane designer and manufacturer for future sustainability improvement.

Abstract: To categorize the different patterns of connecting rod based on the extent to which the product is remanufacturable is very challenging because of the existence of various models and wide tolerances. Sometimes it cannot be done due to the improper pattern recognition system. Mahalanobis-Taguchi System (MTS) is a diagnostic method employing Mahalanobis Distance (MD) for recognizing different patterns in multivariate data. The aim of this work is to apply T method-3, a sub-method of MTS, to the big-end diameter of connecting rod to distinguish between two distinct ranges within the remanufacturability process spectrum. Furthermore, the method also categorizes various patterns of connecting rod based on their MD from unit space with graphical illustration. The case study is performed in an automotive industry as well as in a contract remanufacturing environment in Malaysia. The outcome of this work is expected to be the enhancement of robustness in the remanufacturing system on pattern recognition applicable to the company under study. It is expected that the company will experience time and energy savings and improved work quality. The resulting systematic analysis is expected to enable fast decision-making. Finally, this study is expected to invoke among researchers a sense of seriousness in their approach towards various case studies involving the upgrading of the remanufacturing process that will bring Malaysias remanufacturing capability on par with that of other developed countries.

Abstract: Sustainability has significantly emerged as a critical issue in automotive companies as they have been compelled to be more environmentally benign. Moreover, the role of maintenance management has also been increased as a crucial support function to become a successful and sustainable automotive company. Consequently, it is essential to incorporate sustainability thinking into maintenance management. This paper presents a preliminary framework for sustainable maintenance performance measurement system (SMPMS). The SMPMS is addressed to ensure maintenance management objectives are in-line with overall company objectives in terms of sustainability that balances economic, environmental and social factors.

Abstract: In a cogeneration or combined heat and power plant, a heat recovery steam generator (HRSG) helps achieve overall thermal efficiency as high as 80%. The purpose of this study is to model and simulate the HRSG given partial design point data. The pinch and approach temperatures are optimized within generally accepted range. In order to satisfy the energy conservation equation, tuning parameters are used for the overall heat transfer coefficients corresponding to the evaporator and economizer. For the off-design simulation, the values of pinch and approach temperatures are adjusted until the modeling error is within a set limit. The effect of mass flow rate on the heat transfer coefficient is accounted for & by employing empirical relations. A 12 Ton/hr natural circulation HRSG was considered as a case study. The validation test on inlet temperatures of the exhaust gas and feed water to the economizer demonstrated relative percentage errors of 0.4246% and 1.8776%, respectively. The model can be used for fault detection and diagnostic system design, performance optimization, and environmental load assessment.

Abstract: This paper is an overview of recent issues in determining healthcare delivery systems and aims to explain how Human Factor and Ergonomics (HFE) and simulation modeling can contribute to the quality of patient safety and healthcare delivery. It has been found that the layout of the patient unit and resources are significant factors that influence the amount of medication errors and therefore should be included in any description of the research context. Therefore current trends and applications of HFE as well as simulation modeling and how they can contribute to provide safe, efficient, and effective service to the patients are discussed. This review provides previous work of researchers to identify relationships between these two areas of research, particularly in patient safety. The review suggests that, high rate of medication administration error is due to inefficient healthcare delivery system and highlights the efficiency of simulation modeling versus ergonomics in analyzing the root cause of problems in clinical performance.

Abstract: New ways of relationship and operation between clients and suppliers have been applied by companies looking forward to improvements in their chains, supplier evaluation and selection problem has been studied extensively. This paper aims to present and identify a supplier selection process applied in a huge automotive company. The resource is developed based on a methodological approach of the case studies. The result aims to contribute with the decision process in the choice of qualified suppliers.

Abstract: The objective of this paper is to show, by means of a theoretical review, the influence of reversal logistics on the enterprise competitiveness. Also the relationship between competitive variables and reversal logistics are discussed and analyzed.