A single-lot, unified cost-based flow shop lot-streaming problem

Lot streaming is the process of splitting a production lot into sublots, and then, scheduling the sublots in an overlapping fashion on the machines. In this paper, we present a polynomial-time procedure for determining the number of sublots of a single-lot, multiple-machine flow shop lot-streaming problem in order to minimize a unified cost-based objective function that comprises criteria pertaining to makespan, mean flow time, work-in-process, sublot-attached setup and transfer times. An experimental investigation on the performance of this solution procedure shows its efficacy in generating near-optimal solutions. Results on the relative impact of the weights (marginal costs), used in the unified cost function (corresponding to different measures) on the number of sublots obtained, are also presented.