Autonomous Vehicle fleet Interference-free Scheduling Approach in Robotic Mobile Fulfillment System

doi:10.3969/j.issn.1007-7375.2020.02.007

Abstract

Abstract: Robotic mobile fulfillment system (RMFS) is a system constituted by a fleet of autonomous vehicles (AV). The movement of AVs may be interfered and result in frequent start-stops, which may result in non-efficient energy and poor life span of AVs. To solve this problem, a AVs’ interference-free scheduling approach is proposed based on the idea of no wait job shop scheduling problem (NWJSP) and avoids conflicts by actively waiting. A mathematics model is presented for AVs’ interference-free scheduling problem and simulated annealing algorithm is employed to sequence tasks. An evaluation approach is proposed to evaluate the solution with interference-free scenario. Based on the experiment results, the proposed approach can great reduce the number of AVs’ start-stop without sacrifice of working efficiency. Obviously, the proposed approach has significant advantage on energy-efficiency and extending AVs’ lifespan.

Key words: robotic mobile fulfillment system, autonomous vehicle, interference-free scheduling, no-wait job-shop scheduling

CLC Number:

TP29

SUN Yangjun, ZHAO Ning. Autonomous Vehicle fleet Interference-free Scheduling Approach in Robotic Mobile Fulfillment System[J]. Industrial Engineering Journal, 2020, 23(2): 49-58.

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