Production Rate and Availability Considerations for Reconfigurable Manufacturing System under Degraded Performance Mode

The Reconfigurable Manufacturing System (RMS) are equipped to quickly adjust its hardware and software resources to cope up with the dynamic nature of markets governed by abrupt demands and customized products. The most distinguishable element of these modern systems are the Reconfigurable Machine Tools (RMTs), having modular structure comprised of basic/essential and auxiliary modules. Basic or essential modules are structural in nature while auxiliary modules are the motion imparting modular components. When any of the auxiliary modules fails, still some reduced functionality may be obtained from these machines as these are equipped with multiple numbers of such auxiliary modules. This paper presents the performance of an RMS in terms of availability and production rate from the system when there is a failure of some auxiliary component of an RMT within the system. Failure of auxiliary component simply means that the RMT will still function as long as there is no failure of any essential component but at a reduced level of performance. The results were present in terms of availability and production rate gain from such system and finally the findings were discussed in the light of previous researches carried out on the topic.