International Conference on Engineering Design

Reconfigurable machining system (RMS) is a new class of manufacturing system recently proposed in [1], which aims at combining the high throughput of dedicated manufacturing lines (DML) with the flexibility of flexible manufacturing systems (FMS). An RMS can simultaneously manufacture multiple product types with high throughput comparable to a DML, making it an ideal choice for the high-volume production of product families. A product family manufactured with an RMS, however, requires careful manufacturability evaluation, since even a minor reduction in the unit production cost would result in a large economical benefit due to its high throughput.