New mathematical models for cost-oriented assembly line balancing and worker assignment problems

Nowadays industrial enterprises are facing huge competition. Therefore, use of resources and producing low-cost product have become very crucial topic. In order to increae efficiency, choosing assembly line production system has become mandatory. Assembly line is a production process, where high volume of products assembled with known precedence relations of jobs, in serial workstations and under a certain cycle time. In literature, task times, worker ability, experience and wage rate are taken constant. However, in real life these variables are never same. In order to obtain real costs, it is better to assume task times for stations and wage rates of each worker discrepant and discrepancy depends on difficulty of the task. This mindset has to be applied to solve problems. In this thesis, topic is not discussed in the literature yet, cost-oriented and worker assignment approaches are considered simultaneously, in order to solve assembly line balancing problem. Name of the problem is cost-oriented assembly line balancing and worker assignment. Mixed integer programming method is used to solve problem. At the end cost-oriented approach and worker assignment approach are compared in terms of station quantity