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LaurenK avatar image
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LaurenK asked LaurenK commented

How to Assign Operators to Specific Bay in Rack

Hi Team,

Is there a way to assign an operator to a specific bay in a rack? I have a rack set up with 9 bays. For my simulation I am looking to assign 2 operators to Bays 1 and 2, 1 operator to Bays 3, 4 and 5, and one to the remaining bays.

I was thinking I could use the paint slot tool somehow, but wanted to see if there is a better / more efficient way. For my simulation, we are investigating how many associates should be on the pick line - so for now, I have team size as a parameter. Will assigning an operator to a bay lose the ability to flex the team size?

TIA.

FlexSim 24.1.0
operatorsbayassignments
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1 Answer

Regan Blackett avatar image
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Regan Blackett answered LaurenK commented

Hi @LaurenK,

Depending on how you may have set up your model, there are a couple of approaches you may to take to get what you are looking for. I’ve attached two sample models that may give you some ideas how to proceed. Both of them rely on knowing what Bay ID a Flowitem happened to be assigned to and using that information to make the assignments.

If you are planning on using Centerport-connected objects to transport Flowitems out of your rack, you can assign the Bay ID as a label to the Flowitems and then use that to choose which Operators can be chosen as the transporter. The On Entry trigger will let you know the bay the entering item is placed in using the keyword bay as the value of the label.

In the Use Transport options, you can choose “Center Port by Case” and use this label as the Case Function and then align the label value as the Cases and the corresponding Center ports as the Ports. In the case of the two Operators assigned to Bays 1 and 2, it would be easiest to attach them to a Dispatcher and let the Flowitems in Bay 1 use the Dispatcher as the Center Port connected object.

The other approach would be to use Process Flow to make the bay assignments and the task sequences to transport them out of the Rack. This method is a little more complex, but it allows for greater flexibility.

In this method, I would create tokens for each Operator, and I would assign those tokens a label that that stores their bay assignments. In the case of the two Operators assigned to two bays and the one Operator assigned to 3, I would store that information as an Array.

Then I would use the Find Item activity in process flow to query for an item that is only in a Bay that is in the Array of Bays assigned to the token. Once an item is found you can create a task sequence to transport the item to wherever it needs to go.

You may not want to use a blanket parameter for the overall team size though as figuring out how to assign new Operators to the correct sets of bays, and how that changes the bays the other Operators are also assigned to might be difficult. These models could support a parameter for each set of bay responsibilities though, like having more or fewer Operators assigned to bays 1 and 2 for example.

Pickers Assigned Bays and Find Item.fsm

Pickers Assigned Bays with Ports.fsm


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