Improving design and scheduling process for prefabrication of light gauge steel (LGS) panelized walls

模块化（非现场或预制）建筑行业因其环保的施工过程、施工速度和以具有成本竞争力的价格减少废物而得到越来越广泛的认可。在这方面，模块化建筑提供了高水平的建筑灵活性，例如根据项目要求，墙壁、地板和屋顶面板或组件（单元或容器）。为了充分利用这些优势，模块化建筑公司需要为非现场制造和现场操作制定组织良好的计划。这些措施使模块化制造商能够在不牺牲安全性的情况下不断改进生产过程。为了通过消除过程浪费来提高生产率，可以使用各种工具（如精益、模拟和可视化）重新设计生产过程、设施布局、劳动力管理和物料处理。此外，良好的设计系统（即工作场所和绘图）不仅可以减少受伤的风险，从而通过提高安全性提高施工过程的效率，还可以减少浪费（例如材料浪费和非增值活动），从而提高工厂生产线的生产率。然而，由于缺乏基于模块化的管理系统，许多制造建筑公司面临以下挑战：(1)任务持续时间差异很大；（二）生产线生产过剩、不平衡；(3)各工位工人绩效的变化。为了克服这些挑战，研究小组希望获得以下好处：(1)通过开发基于日常的生产调度系统来提高生产率，该系统将连续流和拉流的概念与模拟和优化相结合，以管理生产过程和资源；(2)通过开发面向模块化的智能设计系统来减少浪费；(3)基于噪声和人体工程学分析，通过设计工业卫生模型，主要关注任务流程和工作场所的设计，提高工人的绩效。

The modular (off-site or prefabricated) construction industry is becoming more widely recognized for its environmentally-friendly construction process, speed of construction, and waste reduction at cost-competitive prices. In this respect, modular construction provides a high level of construction flexibility, such that wall, floor, and roof panels or components (units or containers), based on project requirements. To capitalize on these benefits, modular construction companies need to develop well-organized scheduling for both offsite manufacturing and on-site operations. Such measures allow modular builders to continuously improve their production processes without sacrificing safety. To increase productivity by eliminating process waste, production processes, facility layout, workforce management, and material handling can be redesigned using various tools such as lean, simulation, and visualization. In addition, a well-built design system (i.e., workplace and drafting) can reduce not only the risk of injury, thereby boosting the efficiency of the construction process through improved safety, but also waste (e.g., material waste and non-value-added activities) leading to improve the productivity of the factory line. However, due to the lack of modular-based management systems, many manufacturing construction companies have the following challenges: (1) a wide variation in task durations; (2) overproduction and unbalance on the production line; and (3) a variation of worker performance at each station. To overcome these challenges, the research team expects the following benefits: (1) productivity improvement by developing a daily-based production scheduling system, which integrates the concepts of the continuous and pull flow with simulation and optimization in order to manage the production process and resources; (2) waste reduction by developing a modular-oriented intelligent design system; and (3) improved worker performance by designing an industrial hygiene model, mainly focused on designing task procedures and workplace, based on noise and ergonomic analyses.