Research on assembly module partition for flexible production in mass customization

In order to fulfil the personalized requirements of customers, modern manufacturing industries are facing more requirements for production flexibility, and how to carry out the module partition for production line is becoming the key of solving the problem. Thus, this paper concentrates on the final assembly system and proposes a novel clustering method of assembly module partition considering assembly procedure, equipment and parts. We develop the similarity matrix of assembly process and then assembly modules are generated by utilizing fuzzy clustering method. Finally, a pilot study is conducted to verify the validity of the proposed approach.