How to specify the order quantity and specify the container for packing?

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Sia Sengchoon193 asked Dec 5, '21 Sia Sengchoon193 commented Jan 10, '22

How to specify the order quantity and specify the container for packing?

Ask a few questions, here is my file

What I want to do is when an order comes in, it will let the robotic arm decide which size box to use for packing according to the quantity of the order. For example, if there are 30 orders, use a large carton， 20 orders, use a middle carton， 10 orders, use a small carton，

order source2 is responsible for producing orders and products

source1 is responsible for the production of cardboard for packing

1) The sequence is like this, source1 will continuously produce various cardboards and store them in each rack, and cardboards of different sizes have their own corresponding positions.

2) Then order source2 will notify the robotic arm after receiving the order,

3) The robotic arm grabs the corresponding cardboard according to the order quantity and places it on the processor.

4) The processor is used to turn the cardboard into a carton,

5) After turning it into a carton, the AGV will send it to the combiner for packing.

I have a few problems

the first is:

In source 1, three different sizes of cardboard will be produced,

They are large, medium, and small (currently use color to distinguish),

Put them in Rack 1, 2, 3 (large, medium, and small),

How do I perform the same operation on Rack 4, 5, 6?

Do I need to put two sources?

Because the ideal situation is a source, and then produce cardboard,

The large cardboard is placed on Rack 1, 4, the middle cardboard is placed on Rack 2, 5, and the small cardboard is placed on Rack 3, 6,

The second question is:

How to generate orders and products in order source2?

How to connect the robotic arm to get the order information and grab the corresponding cardboard?

How to import orders?

The third question:

How to box in the combiner?

Can we know the contents of the box after packing?

test.fsm

Software Version:

FlexSim 19.2.4

specific specific container specific order

1638735063438.png (176.8 KiB)

test.fsm (49.2 KiB)

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Joerg Vogel commented · Dec 06, 2021 at 08:05 AM

@Sia Sengchoon193 , may I suggest you read best practices for using this Answers site. Then you split your thread into single questions, if you don’t find answers already given here at this site. For example a combiner has been subject of many threads dealing with order lists. A keyword is therefore “components list”. FlexSim 19.2.x is milestone version. From this version on FlexSim has got a warehouse instead of simple racks. If you want to replace your objects called “rack#” by rack objects I recommend you take a look into warehouse demo model. Thank you for considering my suggestions and good luck with your project! Jörg.

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Sia Sengchoon193 Joerg Vogel commented · Dec 06, 2021 at 05:24 PM

@Joerg Vogel thank you very much!! have a nice day

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Answer 1 · 2021-12-06T11:18:51Z

Felix Möhlmann answered Dec 6, '21 Sia Sengchoon193 commented Jan 10, '22

In future, as Jörg Vogel mentioned, please post single questions if they don't relate to the same topic.

Question 1:
As the type generated is currently random anyway, I'd simply send the cardboard to any rack and have the type depend on where it is send, rather than the other way around. You can then assign the label in a trigger of the racks.

Question 2:
You could use messages to have the 3D objects communicate, but I would suggest to use a process flow instead, as this will make building the logic much easier/more straightforward. I attached an example of how this might be achieved. If you haven't worked with process flow before you might want to work through the tutorials related to it. If you have questions about the model afterward, feel free to comment.

https://docs.flexsim.com/en/19.0/Tutorials/FlexSimBasics/1-3BuildProcessFlow/

test_processFlow.fsm

Question 3:
If you use the "Pack" option of the combiner, the items will be present in the model as subnodes of the box. Subnodes can access them with "object.subnodes[index]".

test-processflow.fsm (67.9 KiB)

· 11

Sia Sengchoon193 commented · Dec 06, 2021 at 05:25 PM

@Felix Möhlmann thank you very much!! have a nice day

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Sia Sengchoon193 commented · Dec 11, 2021 at 02:42 PM

@Felix Möhlmann Hello, I’m sorry to bother you again. According to the sample you made, I followed the same logic and encountered some problems after doing it again. The table part could not be changed to 80 and 26 combiners were allocated, because this time there are more types of cartons, hope to get the solution, and have a nice day.

1211mid.fsm

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1211mid.fsm (210.6 KiB)

Felix Möhlmann Sia Sengchoon193 commented · Dec 12, 2021 at 12:44 PM

- There shouldn't be any a-connections from the racks to the processors. The items are moved by the process flow.

- There should be a centerport-connection between the processor and the robot (rank2 at processor, last rank at robot).

- Two combiners now share two input queues. This has to be reflected in the "Send to Port" of the Processors and Queues the Boxes are send to.

- The entry trigger of the combiners has to be adjusted to determine the column with the label "CombNum", rathern than "Type".

- The connections of the processors to the queues have to be in ascending order, because the boxes are send to the correct queue based on the combiner number/rank in the respective group.

- Combiner15 is missing from the group.

1211mid_1.fsm

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1639312715743.png (9.3 KiB)

1639312732850.png (8.9 KiB)

1639312819044.png (4.7 KiB)

1211mid-1.fsm (211.0 KiB)

Sia Sengchoon193 Felix Möhlmann commented · Dec 12, 2021 at 04:20 PM

@Felix Möhlmann

Thank you! ! This is very helpful to me, I really appreciate it,

But I still encounter several problems in the process of trying,

1) How to set the order quantity (assuming that there are only three orders this time, the model only needs to run three times), that is, how to customize the order content

Or make unlimited orders and keep generating

Or let the order appear in the order of the table,

Or random

2) If there are new racks or cartons, how to join our process flow?

3) The distribution of transportation, if there is a new transporter or want to change the transporter, where should I adjust it?

4) The last point is the question mentioned above, Can we know the contents of the box after packing?

I use the "Pack" option of the combiner, the items will be present in the model as subnodes of the box. Subnodes can access them with "object.subnodes[index]".

But I can’t find object.subnodes[index], I want to know how many products are in each carton after packaging,

Thank you for your answers, and have a nice day！！

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