Verification of Scheduling Efficiency of an Autonomous Assembly System Using the Multi-Agent Manufacturing Simulator

This study is an examination of the effect of agent-based autonomous production scheduling, using the virtual factory on multi-agent simulation system. In the autonomous manufacturing system, a production plan is generated autonomously and dynamically, using communication and negotiation between agents that correspond to factory components. As infrastructure software for agent based manufacturing, the artisoc(c) is used as multi-agent simulator system. In this virtual factory, three types of agents are equipped. Users can operate a configuration such as input new jobs, adjusting a machine setting, etc, with monitoring conditions of agents. Additionally, this simulator has capability of input and output files such as assembly process schedules and logs of practical operations. As a result, by adjustment of the agent’s behavior with factory floor detail, the assembly schedule becomes more effective. The experiment was carried out to show that local negotiations contribute to global optimization when resources in the factory are effectively distributed and shared.