IP Library Granted Patent US 7,577,485
Granted Patent B2
US 7,577,485 · App. 10/507,520 · Granted Aug 18, 2009

Automobile manufacturing line input order planning apparatus

Assignees: Hitachi, Ltd.; Nissan Motor Co., Ltd.; Hitachi Engineering Co., Ltd.
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Quick Facts
Patent No.
US 7,577,485
App. No.
10/507,520
Granted
Aug 18, 2009
Kind
B2
Abstract

The invention is intended to provide a building sequence planning system for an automobile production line, which can prepare an efficient building sequence. The system comprises an input unit ( 1 ) for inputting information of vehicles to be manufactured, a processing unit ( 3 ) for deciding an optimum building sequence based on the vehicle information inputted through the input unit ( 1 ), and an output unit ( 5 ) for externally outputting a building sequence schedule decided by the processing unit ( 3 ). The processing unit ( 3 ) prepares a vehicle building sequence, determines a degree of dissatisfaction of the prepared building sequence, as a penalty value, in accordance with restriction conditions which are inputted through the input unit ( 1 ) and are imposed when building the vehicles into work, and decides a building sequence with a minimum penalty by preparing a plurality of building sequences and determining the penalty value for each building sequence with respect to the restriction conditions.

Claims (8)

1. A building sequence planning system for an automobile production line, said system comprising:

an input unit for inputting vehicle information of vehicles to be manufactured, the vehicle information including the number of vehicles residing or accumulated between two processes,

a processing unit for deciding an optimum building sequence based on the vehicle information inputted through said input unit, and

an output unit for externally outputting a building sequence schedule decided by said processing unit,

wherein said automobile production line is a mixed line including a first line and a second line respectively in parallel, and a third line branching from said second line and joining with said first line,

wherein said processing unit includes an initial offline sequence preparing unit for preparing an initial vehicle building sequence of the automobile production line based on the vehicle information input to said input unit, and operates to output said optimum building sequence by (i) calculating an evaluation value from the vehicle information, including an initial automobile building sequence, input to said input unit, and storing the evaluation value, (ii) calculating a new evaluation value from another, new automobile building sequence, (iii) comparing the new evaluation value with the stored evaluation value, (iv) adopting the new automobile building sequence when the new evaluation value is improved, (v) discarding the new automobile building sequence when the new evaluation value is not improved, (vi) ending processing when repetitive searches have been completed, and (vii) outputting a most recently adopted automobile building sequence as said optimum building sequence.

2. A building sequence planning system for an automobile production line according to claim 1 , wherein the vehicle information includes information relating to when a vehicle has to pass a line twice because of work for two-tone color painting.

3. A building sequence planning system for an automobile production line according to claim 1 , wherein the processing unit shifts an assembly entry time of a vehicle to be assembled by a time corresponding to said number of vehicles residing or accumulated between said two processes.

Assignments (5)
CHANGE OF ADDRESS Recorded Jun 21, 2018
From: HITACHI, LTD.
To: HITACHI, LTD.
Reel/Frame 046400/0781 →
ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNOR'S INTEREST Recorded Jun 21, 2018
From: HITACHI, LTD.
To: NISSAN MOTOR CO., LTD.; HITACHI INDUSTRY & CONTROL SOLUTIONS, LTD.
Reel/Frame 046400/0858 →
MERGER AND CHANGE OF NAME Recorded Dec 27, 2017
From: HITACHI ENGINEERING CO., LTD.; HITACHI INFORMATION & CONTROL SYSTEMS, INC.
To: HITACHI INFORMATION & CONTROL SOLUTIONS, LTD.
Reel/Frame 044961/0071 →
CHANGE OF NAME Recorded Dec 27, 2017
From: HITACHI INFORMATION & CONTROL SOLUTIONS, LTD.
To: HITACHI INDUSTRY & CONTROL SOLUTIONS, LTD.
Reel/Frame 044961/0098 →
ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNOR'S INTEREST Recorded Apr 6, 2005
From: ONIZAWA, HITOSHI; NAKAMURA, KEI; SOEJIMA, HIROSHI; SANADA, YUTAKA; SATO, MASANORI; ICHIKAWA, ATSUMI; SAKAGAMI, SHINICHI
To: HITACHI, LTD.; NISSAN MOTOR CO., LTD.; HITACHI ENGINEERING CO., LTD.
Reel/Frame 016433/0778 →
Priority Claims (1)
JP 2002-071985 · Mar 15, 2002 · national
Continuity (1)
Related Publication 20050182505A1 · Aug 18, 2005