AN AUTOMATED MANUFACTURING SYSTEM-DESIGN METHODOLOGY BASED ON A TRIPLE FLOW MODEL

Automated manufacturing systems (AMSs) are designed to efficiently tra nsform materials into products. The transformation mainly involves thr ee kinds of flows: material, information, and cost. In this paper, we propose a methodology for designing an AMS by constructing a triple fl ow model (TFM) for the AMS, which in turn incorporates three models: a function model representing material flows and the manufacturing proc ess; an information model to control the manufacturing process; and a cost model to reflect resource utilization and material consumption. A lso, the TFM's performance is evaluated and improved. As a holistic so lution for AMS design, the methodology integrates manufacturing proces s design, process control design, activity-based costing, and performa nce improvement. A mold filling system is employed to demonstrate how to construct the TFM and how to set a control parameter for improving the performance.