Simultaneous Multi-skilled Worker Assignment and Mixed-model Two-sided Assembly Line Balancing

This paper addresses a multi-objective mathematical model for the mixed-model two-sided assembly line balancing and worker assignment with different skills. In this problem, the operation time of each task is dependent on the skill of the worker. The following objective functions are considered in the mathematical model: (1) minimizing the number of mated-stations, (2) minimizing the number of stations, and (3) minimizing the total human cost for a given cycle time. Furthermore, maximizing the weighted line efficiency and minimizing the weighted smoothness are two indices considered simultaneously in this paper. Since this problem is well-known as NP-hard class, a particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is developed to solve it. The performance of the proposed PSO algorithm is evaluated with a simulated annealing (SA) algorithm existing in the literature over several benchmarked test problems for the conditions of the current problem in terms of running time and solution quality. The results show the proposed algorithm is an efficient algorithm.