SUMMARY The goal of manufacturing at companies throughout the world is processing orders sooner, faster, and without pausing for retooling, even for lots of one. The buzzwords are `lean`, to describe efficient, unwasteful, less costly manufacturing ; `agile`, said of a manufacturing system' s speed in reconfiguring itself to meet changing demands; and `flexible`, meaning the system' s ability to adjust to customer1 s preferences. Companies are putting customer satisfaction high, or even first, on their list of priorities; and, giving the buyer the freedom to pick a product with the colour, size, shape, and other features dearest to his or her heart is, in effect, manufacturing `a la carte`. Behind this evolution are massive economic pressures for global competitiveness. In order to surmount these kinds of pressure, reduced product costs must go hand in hand with superior quality, evidenced by fewer defects and a reduced failure rate. Electrotechnology and information technology are major contributors to these developments. Computers, networking, communications, and control systems, moreover, not only enable changes but are influenced by them as well. Having the pressures of the global market at one side and the rapid developments of computers and electrotechnology at the other, companies have been using highly automated manufacturing systems to respond the demands of the market. In this sense, `Flexible Manufacturing Systems` have been in use, and it seems that they will be popular for some more time. Although, they are thought to be one of the most important solutions for mid- volume and mid-variety manufacturing systems, misuse of these systems can result in miseries. In this thesis, a solution approach for one of the biggest problems of an FMS is provided: Computer Simulation of an FMS Scheduling and analysis of the results with design of experiments. As we all know, scheduling can directly affect the performance of an FMS. Therefore, a special importance has to be given to this area. In this study, first of all, general knowledge about Flexible Manufacturing Systems is given. Then, after giving brief information about scheduling and simulation, a model for scheduling an FMS system is developed. The method is used to solve a scheduling problem which was published by Kusiak (1986). More or less, the same manufacturing system is used by means of the resources.VI The computer simulation of the system is done, using SIMAN V, one of the powerful, general purpose languages. Then, the analysis of the simulation results are done using design of experiments. Finally, according to the evaluation results of the developed model, it can be said that, simulation is a good tool that can be used for scheduling an FMS. On the other hand, it is found that design of experiments analysis can support the system by generating feedback according to the simulated data. It should not be forgotten that, in order to overcome all these problems, it is necessary to prepare the system as a whole, like the investments at the factory floor. Human-machine integration is needed.
