Process and System Improvement in Plywood Products Manufacturing

该项目将与SEATPLY Products Inc.合作进行，SEATPLY Products Inc.是蒙特利尔胶合板产品制造的中小型企业(SME)。SEATPLY生产高品质的模压胶合板座椅部件，为当地居民提供稳定的就业机会，其中许多人是具有不同文化和其他背景的新移民。生产计划与调度、质量控制与改进、物料搬运与物流优化是充分发挥这类行业生产系统潜力的科学方法。伙伴组织实施了单元化制造框架，以提高生产率和质量。拟议的项目是为数据和信息管理、最优生产调度、最优库存管理和先进的生产流程制定有效的方法，以保证质量。由于生产系统同时使用自动化机器和人工操作，因此在协调和优化这两种类型的操作方面带来了研究挑战。研究的结果将是基于可行和可实施的科学方法的优化解决方案，最终实现高质量的产品、最佳的物流和库存水平，以及减少劳动力波动，使SEATPLY在加拿大这一非常重要的行业中更具竞争力。进行这项研究的学生具有不同的研究和文化背景，并将接受培训，以获得在实际生产系统中进行研究的经验。这些经验将使他们更好地准备解决先进和灵活的制造系统中具有挑战性的实际问题。

The project will be conducted in collaboration with SEATPLY Products Inc., a Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) in plywood products manufacturing in Montreal. SEATPLY produces high quality molded plywood seating components and provides stable job opportunities to local population, many of them are new immigrants of diverse cultural and other backgrounds. Production planning and scheduling, quality control and improvement, material handling and material flow optimization are the scientific methods to achieve full potential of the production system in this type of industry. The partner organization has implemented cellular manufacturing framework for productivity and quality improvement. The proposed project is to develop effective methods for data and information management, optimal production scheduling, optimal inventory management and advanced production process for quality assurance. Since the production system uses both automated machines and manual operations, it creates research challenges in coordinating and optimizing both types of operations. The outcome of the research will be optimized solutions based on scientific methods which are feasible and implementable and ultimately lead to high product quality, optimal material flows and inventory levels, as well as reduced workforce fluctuations making SEATPLY more competitive in this very imported sector of Canadian industry. The students conducting this research have diverse research and culture backgrounds and will be trained to gain experiences in conducting research in a real production system. Such experiences will make them much better prepared to solving challenging practical problems in advanced and flexible manufacturing systems.