Component grouping for GT applications—a fuzzy clustering approach with validity measure

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Abstract
This article was published in the International Journal of Production Research [© Taylor & Francis] and the definitive version is available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00207549508904828The variety of the currently available component grouping methodologies andud algorithms provide a good theoretical basis for implementing GT principles inud cellular manufacturing environments. However, the practical application of theud grouping approaches can be further enhanced through extensions to the widely usedud grouping algorithms and the development of criteria for partitioning componentsud into an 'optimum' number of groups. Extensions to the fuzzy clustering algorithmud and a definition of a new validity measure are proposed in this paper. Theseud are aimed at improving the practical applicability of the fuzzy clusteringud approach for family formation in cellular manufacturing environments. Componentud partitioning is based upon assessing the compactness of components within a groupud and overlapping between the component groups. The developed groupingud methodology is experimentally demonstrated using an industrial case study andud several well known component grouping examples from the published literature

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