Mast

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
The MAnufacturing System Design Tool (MAST) is a simula tion aid for designing a flexible manufacturing system (FMS) involving machine tools. MAST models can represent a variety of hardware components and process control algorithms. This software control lets the designer study the compatibility of FMS hardware and software. MAST uses a free-formatted com puter filing system. Libraries of algorithms are available for alternative software control methods. MAST produces a system performance report which gives the percentage of time a part occupies a station, a storage posi tion, or a transporter. It also gives the average usage and cycle time of each type of pallet, each transporter's cycle time, and the percentage of time each station is busy, idle, or congested because in-process storage is unavailable. These data help the FMS designer to optimize system performance.

This publication has 1 reference indexed in Scilit: