Abstract

MATTHEWS, J.  and  VISAGIE, S.E.. Single fixed crane optimisation within a distribution centre. S. Afr. J. Ind. Eng. [online]. 2011, vol.22, n.2, pp.107-120. ISSN 2224-7890.

This paper considersthe optimisation of the movement of a fixed crane operating in a single aisle of a distribution centre. The crane must move pallets in inventory between docking bays, storage locations, and picking lines. Both a static and a dynamic approach to the problem are presented. The optimisation is performed by means of tabu search, ant colony metaheuristics,and hybrids of these two methods. All these solution approaches were tested on real life data obtained from an operational distribution centre. Results indicate that the hybrid methods outperform the other approaches.

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