A Particle Swarm Optimization Algorithm for a 2-D Irregular Strip Packing Problem

Mohamed A. Shalaby, Mohamed Kashkoush

Mechanical Design and Production Department, Faculty of Engineering, Cairo University, Giza, Egypt.

DOI: 10.4236/ajor.2013.32024                

Abstract

Two-Dimensional Irregular Strip Packing Problem is a classical cutting/packing problem. The problem is to assign, a set of 2-D irregular-shaped items to a rectangular sheet. The width of the sheet is fixed, while its length is extendable and has to be minimized. A sequence-based approach is developed and tested. The approach involves two phases; optimization phase and placement phase. The optimization phase searches for the packing sequence that would lead to an optimal (or best) solution when translated to an actual pattern through the placement phase. A Particle Swarm Optimization algorithm is applied in this optimization phase. Regarding the placement phase, a combined algorithm based on traditional placement methods is developed. Competitive results are obtained, where the best solutions are found to be better than, or at least equal to, the best known solutions for 10 out of 31 benchmark data sets. A Statistical Design of Experiments and a random generator of test problems are also used to characterize the performance of the entire algorithm.

Keywords

Cutting and Packing; Irregular Strip Packing; Nesting; Placement Procedures; Particle Swarm Optimization

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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