JOINT OPTIMIZATION OF ALL INSPECTION PARAMETERS FOR MULTI-STAGE PROCESSES: ALGORITHM, SIMULATION AND TEST SET

摘要

The problem of determining the optimal inspection strategy for a given multistage production process, i.e. an efficient inspection strategy that results in the lowest total inspection cost, is modeled as a joint optimization of all inspection parameters (inspection location, inspection type, inspection limits and sampling characteristics). To solve this problem, a metaheuristic solution approach, namely an Evolutionary Algorithm (EA), is proposed. Simulation is used to calculate the inspection costs for every candidate solution. A test set of problem instances is suggested to explore the characteristics and possibilities of the proposed EA metaheuristic.