Mass productio!l and mass consumption, so far considered virtues in a free economic soceity, have changed. Various problems have occurred including economic stagnation, energy crisis, shortage of material resources, prolifera tion of pollution, lack of skilled labor, rapid changes of product design, technical innovation, and others. Moreover, individual manufacturing firms must take steps to adopt multi-product, small-lot-sized (batch type) produc tion as a type of production in order to adapt themselves to a market movement characterized by a diversified and specialty-oriented society and a short product life cycle. The number of manufacturing firms worldwide that use a type of multi-product, small-lot-sized production is expected to increase. This is so even in the United States, which has been said to be a country of mass production. Multi-product, small-lot-sized production has been considered to be a milestone to flow-type mass production, which has been thought to be the most effective production system. Intensive efforts have been made to investigate mass production systems from both theoretical and practical viewpoints. Few studies have been made for multi-product, small-lot-sized production (batch-type manufacturing). Considering the present business circumstances faced with various difficulties, it is strongly required to establish some theories useful for making practically effective and flexible multi-product, small-lot-sized production systems. Several effective approaches to the batch-type manufacturing systems have been developed. Group technology (GT) is one such method that has steadily obtained great interest from progressive manufacturing firms all over the world.

Inhalt
1 Introduction.- 1.1 Multi-Product, Small-Lot-Sized Production.- 1.2 Effective Approaches to Multi-Product, Small-Lot Sized Production.- 1.3 Group Technology Applications to Production Management.- 2 Basic Principles of Group Technology.- 2.1 Introduction.- 2.2 Part Family Formation and GT Cell.- 2.3 Classification and Coding System.- 2.4 Design Rationalization.- 2.5 Group Production.- 2.6 Group Technology Production Management.- 2.7 Group Technology and Automated Factory Systems.- 3 Process Planning for Group Technology.- 3.1 Essentials of Process Planning.- 3.2 Basic Models of Process Planning.- 3.3 Process Planning Models for Group Technology.- 4 Production Planning for Group Technology.- 4.1 Essentials of Production Planning.- 4.2 Basic Models of Production Planning.- 4.3 Production Planning Models for Group Technology.- 4.4 Lot-Size Analysis for Group Technology.- 5 Machine Loading for Group Technology.- 5.1 Essentials of Machine Loading.- 5.2 Basic Models of Machine Loading.- 5.3 Group Machine Loading Models.- 6 Group Machine Loading with Variable Processing Times.- 6.1 Basic Models of Production Systems with Variable Processing Times.- 6.2 Basic Machine Loading Model with Variable Processing Times.- 6.3 Group Machine Loading Model with Variable Processing Times: A Single-Stage Case.- 6.4 Group Machine Loading Model with Variable Processing Times: A Multi-Stage Case.- 7 Production Scheduling for Group Technology.- 7.1 Essentials of Production Scheduling.- 7.2 Basic Models of Production Scheduling.- 7.3 Single-Stage Group Production Scheduling.- 8 Multi-Stage Group Production Scheduling.- 8.1 Flow-Shop Scheduling.- 8.2 Multi-Stage Group Production Scheduling.- 8.3 Theoretical Approach to Group Scheduling.- 8.4 Branch-and-Bound Approach to Group Scheduling.- 8.5 Heuristic Approach to Multi-Stage Group Scheduling.- 9 Layout Planning for Group Technology.- 9.1 Essentials of Layout Planning.- 9.2 Layout Types and P-Q Analysis.- 9.3 Basic Models of Layout Planning.- 9.4 Layout Planning Model for Group Technology.- 10 Group Technology and Other Related Topics.- 10.1 GT and MRP.- 10.2 GT and CAD/CAM.- 10.3 GT and Engineering Economy.- 10.4 GT and Management Problems.