Modelling and simulation on collaborative work in cellular manufacturing

In cellular manufacturing, it is essential to focus on human issues such as worker assignment strategies, skill identification, teamwork and communication. In order to analyze the impact of collaborative work in cellular manufacturing, agent model of workers was developed and integrated into the production simulation model. Then, comparative simulation experiments of different collaborative work schemes are designed based on the background of a motorcycle engine box production cell. The results indicate that collaboration of multi-skill workers can effectively shorten the lead time of the orders if the multi-skill level of the workers reaches a reasonable level, and the autonomous and collaborative organization is more robust facing to the unstable production environment.