THE SYNTHETIC INDEX ALGORITHM - AN IMPROVED CLUSTER-ANALYSIS PROCEDURE FOR MACHINE CELL-FORMATION

The synthetic index (SI) algorithm is introduced in this paper. This algorithm integrates machine similarity coefficients, component similarity coefficients, and the density indices of the machine-component matrix when forming machine cells for production processes. When applied to a combination of machine cells, this algorithm eliminates the problems caused by bottlenecks and exceptional operations and simultaneously removes the influence of the initial machine-component matrix. © 1990 Taylor & Francis Ltd.