Abstract
Model predictive control (MPC)-based approach to fab-wide scheduling has been suggested to solve constraint-aware production optimization and in-process inventory level control simultaneously at each scheduling instance. However, application of this approach to real fab suffers from computational difficulties brought by the need to solve a huge optimization problem on-line as real fab scheduling problems are characterized by long cycle times, multiple product types, hundreds of machines/processing steps and re-entrant product flows. This study explores the use of an offset-blocking strategy combined with a modified recursive least square (RLS) estimation in the fab-wide scheduler, in order to alleviate the difficulty. The strategy is tested on a modified version of published case study called Intel Mini-Fab (IMF) problem. Despite its simplicity, the blocking strategy showed excellent performance in the face of realistic demand changes and plant/model mismatch.
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Tae Y. Jung obtained his B.S. degree in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and Mathematical Sciences from KAIST, Daejeon, Korea in 2013. He is working towards a Ph.D. degree in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, KAIST. His research interests include the integration of control and scheduling, economic model predictive control, and nonlinear optimization.
Hong Jang obtained his B.S. and M.S. degrees in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering from KAIST, Daejeon, Korea in 2009 and 2011. He is working towards a Ph.D. degree in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, KAIST. His research interests include parameter and state estimation for stochastic systems.
Jay H. Lee obtained his B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Washington, Seattle, in 1986, and his Ph.D. degree in Chemical Engineering from the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, in 1991. From 1991 to 1998, he was with the Department of Chemical Engineering at Auburn University, AL, as an Assistant Professor and an Associate Professor. From 1998 to 2000, he was with the School of Chemical Engineering at Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, and then with the School of Chemical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta. Starting this fall, he will be the Head of the Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department at KAIST, Korea. He held visiting appointments at E. I. Du Pont de Numours, Wilmington, in 1994, and at Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea, in 1997. He was a recipient of the National Science Foundation’s Young Investigator Award in 1993 and was elected as an IEEE Fellow and an IFAC Fellow in 2011. He has published over 120 manuscripts in SCI journals, and has more than 2500 ISI citations. His research interests are in the areas of system identification, state estimation, robust control, model predictive control, and approximate dynamic programming.
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Jung, T.Y., Jang, H. & Lee, J.H. Move blocking strategy applied to re-entrant manufacturing line scheduling. Int. J. Control Autom. Syst. 13, 410–418 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12555-014-0243-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12555-014-0243-9