Configuration Optimization Of Multilayer Shuttle Storage System

In recent years, with the rapid development of the logistics industry, a new type of automatic sorting equipment, multilayer shuttle, has been widely used in the automated warehouse project.This new type of storage system is mainly composed of multilayer shuttle which is in charge of the horizontal movement, and the goods lifting machine which is in charge of the vertical movement. This new type of dense storage system, according to whether the shuttle vehicle can cross the layer to work, it can be divided into two kinds of operation mode:single layer operation mode and cross layer operation mode.Although the work efficiency of single layer operation mode of the shuttle system is very high, however, compared to the cross layer operating mode of the shuttle system, it has two obvious shortcomings:firstly, the utilization rate of each shuttle vehicle is low, in the same roadway,the number of shuttle car is greater than the number of lifting machine, this caused the majority of the shuttle car in the idle state; secondly, the system flexibility and robustness is low, for example, when one shuttle vehicle is broken, then the task of this layer will have to be completed by artificial or in other means, this brings loss to the enterprise.Based on the two reasons above, this paper takes the cross layer shuttle vehicle storage system as the main research object. Firstly, the single layer operation model is established, and then the factors of affecting the delivery time have been analyzed.Through the analysis of single layer operation mode, focusing on the analysis of cross layer operation mode, in the tail of the roadway designing shuttle lifting to complete the movement of vertical of the vehicle, then establish the unloading time series model.after analyzing the unloading efficiency of the system, obtains the time consumption of the shuttle goes between the layer, increasing goods lifting machine’s idle time, which seriously affects the efficiency of unloading time.Therefore, it is necessary to make a reasonable scheduling of cross layer shuttle to minimize the time consumed by crossing layer, shorten the idle time of the goods lifting machine, and then reduce the total time of the unloading operation. The goal of scheduling optimization is to make the delivery time shortest. Through the evolution of the genetic algorithm on cross layer shuttle vehicle scheduling problem, using Matlab programming to solve optimal solution, at last, by changing the number of shuttle vehicles, to analyze the influence on time consuming of the unloading operation of the system. According to the result of example analysis, the configuration of the system is optimized.The research of this paper provides a certain theoretical basis for the designers and enterprises of the shuttle vehicle storage system to arrange the number of the shuttle vehicles reasonably and reduce the cost of the storage system effectively.