Optimization of the capacity of a rose sorting system using discrete event simulation

Optimization of the capacity of a rose sorting system using discrete event simulation

Vreugdenhil, Wouter (TU Delft Mechanical, Maritime and Materials Engineering; TU Delft Marine and Transport Technology)

Pang, Y. (mentor)
Bac, Wouter (mentor)

Delft University of Technology

Marine Technology | Transport Engineering and Logistics

2017-09-05

In Rose cultivation companies in the Netherlands, there is a demand for a higher sorting capacity on the existing sorting systems. The objective for this research is to advice which part of the sorting system needs to be adjusted to gain a higher sorting capacity. For the current sorting systems, five bottlenecks are defined, the bottlenecks limit the sorting capacity. To be able to forecast the effect of machine adjustments, a discrete event simulation model has been constructed, using Simulink and Matlab. This simulation model is verified, matched and validated using data of on an existing rose sorting system. Results of a single day validation showed that the time to process the roses can be simulated with a 97% accuracy. Subsequently, five different simulations are executed. In each simulation, one of the five bottlenecks is removed or reduced. With the results of these simulations the capacity limitation due to each bottleneck is quantified. However entirely removing a bottleneck is not feasible in reality for all bottlenecks. A last situation is simulated where all feasible bottleneck reductions are combined. This showed that the time to sort all roses is reduced by 35%.

Discrete Event Simulation
Rose
Sorting system
Optimization

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:ee6dbfd2-f5d2-4366-86f6-d4dcea609d7b

2020-09-05

Student theses

master thesis

© 2017 Wouter Vreugdenhil