This book introduces several mathematical models in assembly line balancing based on stochastic programming and develops exact and heuristic methods to solve them. An assembly line system is a manufacturing process in which parts are added in sequence from workstation to workstation until the final assembly is produced. In an assembly line balancing problem, tasks belonging to different product models are allocated to workstations according to their processing times and precedence relationships among tasks. It incorporates two features, uncertain task times, and demand volatility, separately and simultaneously, into the conventional assembly line balancing model. A real-life case study related to the mask production during the COVID-19 pandemic is presented to illustrate the application of the proposed framework and methodology. The book is intended for graduate students who are interested in combinatorial optimizations in manufacturing with uncertain input.

Applied Systems Analysis: Science and Art of Solving Real-Life Problems Subject Guide: Engineering - Industrial and Manufacturing Any activity is aimed at solving certain problems, which means transferring a system from an existing unsatisfactory problematic state to a desired state. The success or failure of the system depends on how its natural properties were implemented during the planning of improvement and intervention state. This book covers the theory and experience of successfully solving problems in a practical and general way. This book includes a general survey of modern systems analysis; offers several original results; presents the latest methodological and technological results of the theory of systems; introduces achievements; and discusses the transition from the ideology of the machine age to the ideology of the systems age. This book will be of interest to both professionals and academicians.

Defects generate a great economic problem for suppliers who are faced with increased duties. Customers expect increased efficiency and dependability of technical product of - also growing - complexity. The authors give an introduction to a theory of dependability for engineers. The book may serve as a reference book as well, enhancing the knowledge of the specialists and giving a lot of theoretical background and practical information, especially on the dependability analysis of whole systems.

The theory, concepts and approaches are well explained by examples and solutions. The topics include: Mathematical basis, Life span distributions, System dependability theory, Failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA), Fault tree analysis, Dependability test planning, Test evaluation, Calculation of repairable systems, Dependability protection programs.

The author has spent approximately 50 years in the field of systems engineering. This Focus book provides a "looking back" at his 50-year run and the lessons he learned and would like to share with other engineers, so they can use these lessons in their day-to-day work in systems engineering and related fields. The book is written from a systems engineering perspective. It offers 50 lessons learned working for a variety of different companies, which can be used across many other engineering fields. The book will be of interested to students and engineers across many fields, as well as students and engineers working in business and management fields.

Post Normal Accident revisits Perrow's classic Normal Accident published in 1984 and provides additional insights to our sociological view of safety-critical organisations. The operating landscape of high-risk systems has indeed profoundly changed in the past 20 to 30 years but the core sociological models of safety remain associated with classics of the 1980s and 1990s. This book examines the conceptual and empirical evolutions of the past two to three decades to explore their implications for safety management, based on several strands of works in various research traditions in safety (e.g. cognitive engineering and system safety, high-reliability organisation, sociology of safety, regulatory studies) and other interdisciplinary fields (e.g. international business, globalisation studies, strategy management, ecology). It offers a new and inciteful interpretation to the challenges of today. It investigates how globalisation has reconfigured the operating landscape of high-risk systems and emphasises the importance of thinking safety through a strategic angle. This book serves as an ideal resource for the safety professionals and safety researchers from any established disciplines such as sociology, engineering, psychology, political science or management.

Post Normal Accident revisits Perrow's classic Normal Accident published in 1984 and provides additional insights to our sociological view of safety-critical organisations. The operating landscape of high-risk systems has indeed profoundly changed in the past 20 to 30 years but the core sociological models of safety remain associated with classics of the 1980s and 1990s. This book examines the conceptual and empirical evolutions of the past two to three decades to explore their implications for safety management based on several strands of works in various research traditions in safety (e.g. cognitive engineering and system safety, high-reliability organisation, sociology of safety, regulatory studies) and other interdisciplinary fields (e.g. international business, globalisation studies, strategy management, ecology). It offers a new and insightful interpretation to the challenges of today. It investigates how globalisation has reconfigured the operating landscape of high-risk systems and emphasises the importance of thinking safety through a strategic angle. This book serves as an ideal resource for the safety professionals and safety researchers from any established disciplines such as sociology, engineering, psychology, political science or management. Features: Introduces an original analysis of popular safety writings, including Normal Accident, by Perrow Identifies the importance of thinking safety from a sociological angle with the help of key writers Stresses the need for greater sensitivity to strategy and "errors from the top" when it comes to the safety of high-risk systems Explains how globalisation has reconfigured the operating landscape of high-risk systems Renews our understanding of the current safety management challenges in an increasingly global risk picture

This textbook provides fundamental understanding on technological aspects related to arc welding, heat flow, relevant metallurgical transformations, and quality assurance methodologies joints. It has been composed keeping in purview the requirements of those interested in research and development in the field of metal joining. The contents focus on the fundamentals of physics of welded joints, arc welding processes, brazing and soldering, heat flow in welding, welding metallurgy, design of welded joints, and inspection and testing of welded joints and weldability of metals. This book will be useful to both academics and those in the industry.

This book introduces the methods for predicting the future behavior of a system's health and the remaining useful life to determine an appropriate maintenance schedule. The authors introduce the history, industrial applications, algorithms, and benefits and challenges of PHM (Prognostics and Health Management) to help readers understand this highly interdisciplinary engineering approach that incorporates sensing technologies, physics of failure, machine learning, modern statistics, and reliability engineering. It is ideal for beginners because it introduces various prognostics algorithms and explains their attributes, pros and cons in terms of model definition, model parameter estimation, and ability to handle noise and bias in data, allowing readers to select the appropriate methods for their fields of application.Among the many topics discussed in-depth are:* Prognostics tutorials using least-squares* Bayesian inference and parameter estimation* Physics-based prognostics algorithms including nonlinear least squares, Bayesian method, and particle filter* Data-driven prognostics algorithms including Gaussian process regression and neural network* Comparison of different prognostics algorithms The authors also present several applications of prognostics in practical engineering systems, including wear in a revolute joint, fatigue crack growth in a panel, prognostics using accelerated life test data, fatigue damage in bearings, and more. Prognostics tutorials with a Matlab code using simple examples are provided, along with a companion website that presents Matlab programs for different algorithms as well as measurement data. Each chapter contains a comprehensive set of exercise problems, some of which require Matlab programs, making this an ideal book for graduate students in mechanical, civil, aerospace, electrical, and industrial engineering and engineering mechanics, as well as researchers and maintenance engineers in the above fields.

Every technical investigation involving trial-and-error experimentation embodies a strategy for deciding what experiments to perform, when to quit, and how to interpret the data. This handbook presents several statistically derived strategies which are more efficient than any intuitive approach and will get the investigator to their goal with the fewest experiments, give the greatest degree of reliability to their conclusions, and keep the risk of overlooking something of practical importance to a minimum. Features: Provides a comprehensive desk reference on experimental design that will be useful to practitioners without extensive statistical knowledge Features a review of the necessary statistical prerequisites Presents a set of tables that allow readers to quickly access various experimental designs Includes a roadmap for where and when to use various experimental design strategies Shows compelling examples of each method discussed Illustrates how to reproduce results using several popular software packages on a supplementary website Following the outlines and examples in this book should quickly allow a working professional or student to select the appropriate experimental design for a research problem at hand, follow the design to conduct the experiments, and analyze and interpret the resulting data. John Lawson and John Erjavec have a combined 25 years of industrial experience and over 40 years of academic experience. They have taught this material to numerous practicing engineers and scientists as well as undergraduate and graduate students.

In many businesses, supply chain people are trapped in reactive roles where they source, contract, purchase, receive, warehouse, and ship as a service. However, in some businesses suppliers contribute to improvement programs, technology, funding, marketing, logistics, and engineering expertise. Breaking into a proactive supply chain role takes broad thinking, a talent for persuasion, and the courage to go after it. This book supplies proven methods to help you do so. A Practical Introduction to Supply Chain describes how to run an efficient supply chain that exceeds expectations in terms of cost, quality, and supplier delivery. It explains the need to integrate systems, the flow of information, and the way in which people work together between commercial purchasing, materials management, and distribution parts of the supply chain. Sharing powerful insights from the perspective of a supply chain manager, the book details practical techniques drawn from the author's decades of experience. It presents methods that apply directly to supply chains involving a physical product, manufactured internally or outsourced, as well as physical operations such as oilfield services. This book demonstrates how to make a supply chain organization work in practice-contributing more to business success than traditional purchasing and logistics organizations can. In addition to writing about practical supply chain issues and approaches, the author also describes proven methods he used while working with client teams on assignments. He also details some of the ways his teams used to manage the people part of the change.

Maintenance Audits Handbook: A Performance Measurement Framework explores the maintenance function and performance of an organization, and outlines the key aspects required for an effective and efficient maintenance performance measurement (MPM) system. Incorporating different aspects of traditional literature and considering various frameworks on the subject, it examines the auditing process as well as the use and development of maintenance metrics. It identifies different frameworks and models showcasing how MPM systems should be implemented as well as the values that are created when different frameworks are used. The book presents performance indicators within a framework that classifies and sorts according to functional and hierarchical aspects. It introduces techniques that can help determine the right set of performance indicators. It also outlines a process that combines both numerical indicators with the classical result of massive questionnaires successfully incorporating both the quantitative and qualitative aspects of maintenance performance. In addition, the author provides examples of MPM frameworks that are used in organizations with condition-based, vibration-based, and reliability-centered maintenance. A useful handbook for students and maintenance professionals, this book provides readers with an understanding of how to Align the organizational strategy to the strategies of the maintenance function Link the maintenance performance measures to the different hierarchies of the organization and establish effective communication between them Translate the MPIs at operational level to the corporate level (to create value for the whole organization and its customers) Identify the weaknesses and strengths of the implemented maintenance strategy Maintenance Audits Handbook: A Performance Measurement Framework provides readers with a sound foundation for developing and measuring a comprehensive maintenance improvement strategy using qualitative and quantitative data, and serves as an ideal resource for maintenance/mechanical engineers, maintenance/performance/business/production managers and industry professionals involved in maintenance.

Although there is increasing need for modeling and simulation in the IC package design phase, most assembly processes and various reliability tests are still based on the time consuming "test and try out" method to obtain the best solution. Modeling and simulation can easily ensure virtual Design of Experiments (DoE) to achieve the optimal solution. This has greatly reduced the cost and production time, especially for new product development. Using modeling and simulation will become increasingly necessary for future advances in 3D package development. In this book, Liu and Liu allow people in the area to learn the basic and advanced modeling and simulation skills to help solve problems they encounter. * Models and simulates numerous processes in manufacturing, reliability and testing for the first time * Provides the skills necessary for virtual prototyping and virtual reliability qualification and testing * Demonstrates concurrent engineering and co-design approaches for advanced engineering design of microelectronic products * Covers packaging and assembly for typical ICs, optoelectronics, MEMS, 2D/3D SiP, and nano interconnects * Appendix and color images available for download from the book's companion website Liu and Liu have optimized the book for practicing engineers, researchers, and post-graduates in microelectronic packaging and interconnection design, assembly manufacturing, electronic reliability/quality, and semiconductor materials. Product managers, application engineers, sales and marketing staff, who need to explain to customers how the assembly manufacturing, reliability and testing will impact their products, will also find this book a critical resource. Appendix and color version of selected figures can be found at www.wiley.com/go/liu/packaging

This book gathers contributions presented at the 10th Workshop on Cyclostationary Systems and Their Applications, held in Grodek nad Dunajcem, Poland in February 2017. It includes twelve interesting papers covering current topics related to both cyclostationary and general non stationary processes. Moreover, this book, which covers both theoretical and practical issues, offers a practice-oriented guide to the analysis of data sets with non-stationary behavior and a bridge between basic and applied research on nonstationary processes. It provides students, researchers and professionals with a timely guide on cyclostationary systems, nonstationary processes and relevant engineering applications.

This book introduces the latest research on advanced control charts and new machine learning approaches to detect abnormalities in the smart manufacturing process. By approaching anomaly detection using both statistics and machine learning, the book promotes interdisciplinary cooperation between the research communities, to jointly develop new anomaly detection approaches that are more suitable for the 4.0 Industrial Revolution. The book provides ready-to-use algorithms and parameter sheets, enabling readers to design advanced control charts and machine learning-based approaches for anomaly detection in manufacturing. Case studies are introduced in each chapter to help practitioners easily apply these tools to real-world manufacturing processes. The book is of interest to researchers, industrial experts, and postgraduate students in the fields of industrial engineering, automation, statistical learning, and manufacturing industries.

This book covers recent advances in efficiency evaluations, most notably Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) methods. It introduces the underlying theories, shows how to make the relevant calculations and discusses applications. The aim is to make the reader aware of the pros and cons of the different methods and to show how to use these methods in both standard and non-standard cases. Several software packages have been developed to solve some of the most common DEA and SFA models. This book relies on R, a free, open source software environment for statistical computing and graphics. This enables the reader to solve not only standard problems, but also many other problem variants. Using R, one can focus on understanding the context and developing a good model. One is not restricted to predefined model variants and to a one-size-fits-all approach. To facilitate the use of R, the authors have developed an R package called Benchmarking, which implements the main methods within both DEA and SFA. The book uses mathematical formulations of models and assumptions, but it de-emphasizes the formal proofs - in part by placing them in appendices -- or by referring to the original sources. Moreover, the book emphasizes the usage of the theories and the interpretations of the mathematical formulations. It includes a series of small examples, graphical illustrations, simple extensions and questions to think about. Also, it combines the formal models with less formal economic and organizational thinking. Last but not least it discusses some larger applications with significant practical impacts, including the design of benchmarking-based regulations of energy companies in different European countries, and the development of merger control programs for competition authorities.

The book discusses, elaborates on and answers questions to the following points: Firstly, what has changed through the information technology represented by software, Internet and big data? How do these changes effect the production relationships, the production mode and the industrial development model? Can China realize a "great-leap-forward" in economic development by promoting such a new Internet economy? Secondly, what is the format shown by the Internet economy? Is the Internet economy a market economy, or a planned economy, or is it an economic complex format which combines the planned economy and the market economy? What is the structure of the future economy? Which entities will compete with each other throughout the industries? What is the format of the future financial investment industry? Why does the Internet economy have a revolutionary impact on the economic base and the superstructure? Thirdly, let us look back on the traditional manufacturing industry. What on earth is the core value of the manufacturing industry? How is the core technology and core value of manufacturing realized? Why can it be that the industrial Internet will become a rare historical opportunity for China's manufacturing industry and economy to achieve a "great-leap-forward" development? Finally, in the big economic tide of Internet and big data, what are the future variables of China's economy? What is the established economic policy of the United States for the global economy and industries? How should the economic variables of the United States be best dealt with, those that are determined as "US priority" and "the return of manufacturing industry" strongly promoted by the U.S. President Trump?

At first sight discrete and fractional programming techniques appear to be two com pletely unrelated fields in operations research. We will show how techniques in both fields can be applied separately and in a combined form to particular models in location analysis. Location analysis deals with the problem of deciding where to locate facilities, con sidering the clients to be served, in such a way that a certain criterion is optimized. The term "facilities" immediately suggests factories, warehouses, schools, etc., while the term "clients" refers to depots, retail units, students, etc. Three basic classes can be identified in location analysis: continuous location, network location and dis crete location. The differences between these fields arise from the structure of the set of possible locations for the facilities. Hence, locating facilities in the plane or in another continuous space corresponds to a continuous location model while finding optimal facility locations on the edges or vertices of a network corresponds to a net work location model. Finally, if the possible set of locations is a finite set of points we have a discrete location model. Each of these fields has been actively studied, arousing intense discussion on the advantages and disadvantages of each of them. The usual requirement that every point in the plane or on the network must be a candidate location point, is one of the mostly used arguments "against" continuous and network location models."

This book provides a Management Science approach to quality management in food production. Aspects of food quality, product conformance and reliability/food safety are examined, starting with wheat and ending with its value chain transformation into bread. Protein qualities that influence glycemic index levels in bread are used to compare the value chains of France and the US. With Kaizen models the book shows how changes in these characteristics are the result of management decisions made by the wheat growers in response to government policy and industry strategy. Lately, it provides step-by-step instructions on how to apply kaizen methodology and Deming's work on quality improvement to make the HACCPs (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points) in food safety systems more robust.

Seeking new technologies for the development of industrial control has become a major challenge for the control industry. This book introduces the novel methodologies, architectures and algorithms of intelligent control systems, and their industrial applications. The intelligent systems addressed include: neural networks, fuzzy logic, rule base, and genetic algorithms - each having a strong industrial application. The main features are:
* Introduction to intelligent systems technologies under an industrial control framework
* Application of novel forms of knowledge base and reasoning, such as neural networks
* Review of the concepts and fundamentals of pattern mapping, associative memories, generalization, and learning
* Description of the practical aspects of industrial intelligent control necessary for the design and implementation of a successful intelligent system
* End-of-chapter worked or simulation examples which enable the reader to implement effectively the methods illustrated
Written by an IFAC President-Elect, this book describes how to develop, design, and apply intelligent systems to solve complex industrial control problems. The accessible approach to the intelligent control strategies will appeal to the control engineer working in process industries. Professional engineers, researchers and postgraduate students in electrical, mechanical, and chemical engineering, as well as computer science, will also find this text an invaluable reference source.

This book provides information on the generation and the effects of hazardous substances that are produced during welding and allied processes. These processes are thermal cutting, thermal spraying, soldering and brazing. The book offers guidance on the determination of hazardous substances and it simplifies assessment of the hazard due to hazardous substances. In addition, the book explains tests in order to understand the concentration and intensity of key hazardous substances. Last but not least, the book suggests several possibilities of avoiding the risk to worker's health as a result of exposing them to these substances.

The book begins with an introduction to software reliability, models and techniques. The book is an informative book covering the strategies needed to assess software failure behaviour and its quality, as well as the application of optimization tools for major managerial decisions related to the software development process. It features a broad range of topics including software reliability assessment and apportionment, optimal allocation and selection decisions and upgradations problems. It moves through a variety of problems related to the evolving field of optimization of software reliability engineering, including software release time, resource allocating, budget planning and warranty models, which are each explored in depth in dedicated chapters. This book provides a comprehensive insight into present-day practices in software reliability engineering, making it relevant to students, researchers, academics and practising consultants and engineers.

In order to satisfy the needs of their customers, network utilities require specially developed maintenance management capabilities. Maintenance Management information systems are essential to ensure control, gain knowledge and improve-decision making in companies dealing with network infrastructure, such as distribution of gas, water, electricity and telecommunications. Maintenance Management in Network Utilities studies specified characteristics of maintenance management in this sector to offer a practical approach to defining and implementing the best management practices and suitable frameworks.
Divided into three major sections, Maintenance Management in Network Utilities defines a series of stages which can be followed to manage maintenance frameworks properly. Different case studies provide detailed descriptions which illustrate the experience in real company situations. An introduction to the concepts is followed by main sections including:

A Literature Review: covering the basic concepts and models needed for framework design, development and implementation.
Framework Design and Definition: developing the basic pillars of network utilities maintenance management framework.
Performance Evaluation & Maturity: focusing on the reliability concept and maturity models from different viewpoints.

By establishing basic foundations for creating and maintaining maintenance managements strategies, Maintenance Management in Network Utilities acts a practical handbook for all professionals in these companies and across areas such as network development, operations management and marketing.
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The book concentrates on powder flow properties, their measurement and applications. These topics are explained starting from the interactions between individual particles up to the design of silos. A wide range of problems are discussed - such as flow obstructions, segregation, and vibrations. The goal is to provide a deeper understanding of the powder flow, and to show practical solutions.

This book gives a comprehensive overview of the rapidly evolving field of three-dimensional (3D) printing, and its increasing applications in the biomedical domain. 3D printing has distinct advantages like improved quality, cost-effectiveness, and higher efficiency compared to traditional manufacturing processes. Besides these advantages, current challenges and opportunities regarding choice of material, design, and efficiency are addressed in the book. Individual chapters also focus on select areas of applications such as surgical guides, tissue regeneration, artificial scaffolds and implants, and drug delivery and release. This book will be a valuable source of information for researchers and professionals interested in the expanding biomedical applications of 3D printing.