Study on Integrated Storage Systems for Automobile Production

Automobile manufacturing consists of body-line, painting-line, and assembly-line. These production lines are disposed in series and go through a flow process, so according to the status of pre & post processing, a suspension happens in a line by a starvation(impossibility of production by insufficient supply) or blocking(impossibility of production by exceed capacity). Therefore, to prevent a loss of production coming from a starvation or blocking, a storage such as WBS or PBS is independently owned and operated. The paper suggests the simulation model of integrated storage which can operate it by integrating each storage performing a role as a buffer of line. Specifically, the paper found the answers about reasonable number of Stacker Crane and AGV(Automatic Guided Vehicle) and suggested a methodology of operation which is available to operate them. Also, it compared an efficiency between a model of current storage and integrated storage through simulation. As a result, it turned out that the model suggested in the paper was more efficient on suspension of painting-line stop than a current storage.