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Sean B avatar image
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Transfer Items on Conveyor while delaying others

I am trying to get the incoming 3 Types of Items to be sent to their respective locations while rotating and transferring. The rotate/transfer cycle time is 36s (18s for the specific Type to be rotated and transferred on to a side conveyor, and 18s for the conveyor's rotator to return to its original position to allow the other Types to continue on to their conveyors.) The items come in order of Type 1, Type 2, Type 3 every 30-45s. When Type 1 comes to DP2 it rotates and transfers onto it's designated conveyor while the other two types are held back until the 36s cycle has completed. I have attempted this two different ways:

1) A decision point rotate over time/delay on decision point for the specified type to go to its final location.

2) A Restricted area to restrain the waiting items while the specified one continues on.

I have attached the simulation and a sketch of the system;

1627054770750.jpeg20C25M02R00.fsm


FlexSim 21.1.4
flexsim 21.1.4rotating and transferring items
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1 Answer

Eric M avatar image
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Eric M answered Sean B commented

Hi @Sean B, I used triggers on the DPs to get the item to stop and rotate (both over 18 seconds). I then used process flow to get the delay time right. It basically works by stopping the item when it enters the conveyor and trying to acquire a resource. If it does get the resource, it will start moving again. If it's Type1, it will delay for 36 seconds before letting the next token acquire the resource. If it's Type2 or 3, it will immediately release the resource and move on in the flow.

One other note, to make the Stop and Resume activities work, I needed to change the two rotating conveyors to accumulating (otherwise stopping the next item stops the entire conveyor). Let me know if you have any questions about how things are working!

20c25m02r00_1.fsm


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Sean B avatar image Sean B commented ·
Thanks Eric! I think the only question I have is something that I messed up when I tried it before:

- Is there a way to set it up so only one source is producing the items but it is sending them out in the same order? I think the system is supposed to be 1 item every 30-45s rather than a triplet every 30-45s but I couldn't get the order correct without messing up the timing.

Thanks again for all your help!

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Eric M avatar image Eric M Sean B commented ·

No problem! One way to do that would be to change the Arrival Style of the source to an Arrival Schedule. Then you can edit the table to be something like this and check the repeating box:

1627069651941.png

You could also do something in process flow that might give you more control over the randomness of the arrival time. I added a little example in process flow.

20c25m02r00-2.fsm

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Sean B avatar image Sean B Eric M commented ·
Great! Thank you so much.
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