HEURISTIC DISPATCHING MODELS FOR MULTIVEHICLE MATERIALS HANDLING SYSTEMS

This paper describes fleet-size-dependent models for predicting dispat ching effects in multi-vehicle materials-handling systems. The models are a direct extension of recently published analytical bounds on empt y-vehicle travel, which are based exclusively on vehicle travel times and material flow rates in a system. As with these earlier models, the models presented in this paper are intended to support the design of materials-handling systems. By directly accounting for the number of v ehicles used in a system, the proposed models attempt to provide more refined insights into the effectiveness of using vehicle dispatching t o deal with temporary peaks in system workload, as an alternative to d esigning a system with sufficient capacity to handle worst case operat ing scenarios. Simulation experiments are used to test the effectivene ss of the proposed models and provide a comparison with earlier models reported in the literature.