Constraint Programming Approach to Precast Production Scheduling
Publication: Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
Volume 128, Issue 6
Abstract
Current scheduling practices in precast plants are fairly basic and depend greatly on experience. This may lead to inefficient resource utilization, over-inventory, and/or missing delivery dates. Computer assisted scheduling may therefore be useful in producing better production schedules. This paper shows how constraint programming (CP) can be applied in production scheduling for precast plants. The paper describes a constrained precast scheduling model that incorporates the key constraints and objectives considered by production schedulers. A capacity-based backward-scheduling earliest due date rule and a CP approach are developed to solve the model. The CP approach is computationally efficient, even though it incorporates many problem-derived constraints. The efficiency of the CP approach lies in the fact that the representation (model) is separated from the algorithm (solver). Strategies to improve the performance of the CP approach are identified, and the CP approach is compared against commonly used heuristic rules on an example problem.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
Volume 128 • Issue 6 • December 2002
Pages: 513 - 521
Copyright
Copyright © 2002 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Jul 17, 2000
Accepted: Dec 4, 2001
Published online: Nov 15, 2002
Published in print: Dec 2002
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