Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977
DOI 10.1007/s00170-007-1138-1
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Determining the parameters of dual-card kanban system:
an integrated multicriteria and artificial neural network
methodology
Ozlem Uzun Araz & Ozgur Eski & Ceyhun Araz
Received: 1 December 2006 / Accepted: 20 June 2007 / Published online: 14 August 2007
# Springer-Verlag London Limited 2007
Abstract In this study, we proposed a methodology for
determining the design parameters of kanban systems. In
this methodology, a backpropagation neural network is
used in order to generate simulation meta-models, and a
multi-criteria decision making technique (TOPSIS) is
employed to evaluate kanban combinations. In order to
reflect the decision maker’s point of view, different weight
structures are used to find the optimum design parameters.
The proposed methodology is applied to a case problem
and the results are presented. We also performed several
experiments on different types of problems to show the
effectiveness of the methodology.
Keywords Kanban . Multicriteria decision making .
Simulation metamodeling . Artificial neural networks
1 Introduction
Just-in-time (JIT) is a management philosophy that encour-
ages improvement through inventory reduction and elimi-
nates manufacturing wastes by producing only the right
quantity at the right time. The use of JIT philosophy results
in some important improvements to the company, such as
O. U. Araz (*) : O. Eski : C. Araz
Industrial Engineering Department, Dokuz Eylul University,
35100 Izmir, Turkey
e-mail: ozlem.uzun@deu.edu.tr
O. Eski
e-mail: ozgur.eski@deu.edu.tr
C. Araz
e-mail: ceyhun.araz@deu.eu.tr
inventory reduction, higher throughput times, better deliv-
ery performance, higher machine utilization, lower costs,
and greater profits.
In traditional manufacturing systems, the materials are
pushed through the system and the finished products are
stocked so as to meet expected demand. On the other hand,
JIT systems are ‘pull’ production systems which withdraws
the appropriate quantity of material needed satisfying the
final schedule requirements. Therefore the ‘pull’ production
system produces only the quantity of parts required to
replace those that have been withdrawn.
A kanban system is one of the important elements of JIT
philosophy. Kanban means card in Japanese. In a kanban
system, cards are used systematically to control the produc-
tion within stations and the movement of parts between
stations. They also help to visualize and control work-
in-process (WIP) inventories [1]. Therefore, kanban system
can be defined as a decentralized system that harmoniously
controls the production of the necessary products in the
necessary quantities at the necessary time [2].
According to their functions, different types of kanbans
can be formed such as supply kanban, procurement kanban,
subcontract kanban, auxiliary kanban [3]. Two types of
kanbans are generally used: withdrawal kanban and
production kanban. A withdrawal kanban defines the
quantity that the succeeding workstation should withdraw
from the preceding one while a production kanban defines
the quantity which the preceding workstation must produce.
In kanban systems, the efficiency of the manufacturing
system depends on several factors such as the total number
of kanbans, transport sizes (container size), safety storage
sizes, the sequencing rules, etc. [4]. For instance, the
inventory levels can be controlled by the total number of
kanbans. If too many kanbans are used, the result is large
amount of work-in process inventory at each workstation.
966
Conversely, reducing the number of kanbans causes a
decrease in work-in-process inventory but also leads to a
reduction in the system throughput rate [5]. Hence, deter-
mining the best combination of kanban system parameters is
a critical decision.
In general, simulation is used as a tool to analyze such
complex problems. However, the use of simulation is time
consuming, due to the combinatorial nature of the problem.
In order to overcome these limitations of simulation, meta-
modeling approaches have been widely used. A metamodel
is a mathematical approximation of a simulation model that
represents the relationship between inputs and outputs. The
use of metamodeling approach is helpful when the
simulation becomes very large and costly. In general,
regression analysis has been combined with simulation for
building simulation metamodels [6]. However, regression
metamodels have some drawbacks: it is limited to approx-
imate a subset of the simulation domain, sensitive to
deviations from statistical model assumptions, and it is
possible to select incorrect functional form during the
analysis [7]. On the other hand, some researchers have
stated that meta-modeling through artificial neural network
(ANN) models may overcome these disadvantages of
traditional regression approaches [7, 8].
Performances of kanban systems are generally measured
by more than one performance measures, usually in conflict.
If a decision maker is interested in optimizing all objectives
simultaneously, an aggregated weighted function has to be
defined. Some researchers have used cost function as
aggregated weighted function in order to evaluate all
possible kanban combinations (see e.g., [5, 9]). However,
in real life, construction of the cost function is a difficult
task because of incommensurable nature of some perfor-
mance measures such as average customer delay time,
maximum customer delay time, the number of demand
backordered, etc. Multi-criteria decision making (MCDM)
approaches may be helpful in evaluating the alternative
kanban combinations with regards to multiple performance
measures.
This paper presents an integrated MCDM and ANN
methodology in order to determine the optimum kanban
parameters. A backpropagation neural network is used for
generating simulation metamodels. Instead of using an
aggregated cost function, TOPSIS [10], which is a well-
known MCDM technique, is employed to evaluate kanban
combinations. We also performed some experiments in
order to investigate the effectiveness of the methodology.
This paper is further organized as follows. Section 2
presents a summary of the related literature. In Sect. 3, a
brief description about ANN is given. Section 4 contains a
description of TOPSIS method. Section 5 is devoted to
explain the proposed methodology. The proposed method-
ology is applied on a case problem in Sect. 6. Some
Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977
experiments are also performed in the same section. Final
section includes concluding remarks.
2 Literature review
Several studies have been done to find the number of
kanbans required in JIT system. A detailed review on JIT
and kanban systems can be found in Akturk and Erhun [1],
and Huang and Kusiak [3]. In most of the existing studies,
kanban systems are modeled by using mathematical
programming, Markov chains or simulation approaches.
Kimura and Terada [11] developed the first mathematical
model for the kanban system. In an extended version of
Kimura and Terada’s study, Bitran and Chang [12] used a
nonlinear integer formulation for kanban determination
problem. Bard and Golany [13] developed a mixed integer
linear program to determine the number of kanbans.
Philipoom et al. [14] developed a nonlinear integer
mathematical model for the multi-item, multi-stage, multi-
period, capacitated kanban system. Husseini et al. [15]
proposed a methodology using an integer linear program-
ming technique to flexibly determine the number of
kanbans while minimizing total inventory cost. Wang and
Sarker [16] developed a mixed integer nonlinear mathe-
matical model for determining the optimal number of
kanbans, batch size, the number of batches and total
quantity over one period for a multistage supply chain
system.
Markov chains have been widely used to describe the
behavior of kanban system and to find the optimum number
of kanbans. Askin et al. [17] determined the optimum
number of production kanbans by using a continuous time,
steady state Markov model for multi-item, multi-stage serial
production system. Nori and Sarker [18] used Markov
Chains to model a single card kanban system and found the
optimum number of kanbans between two adjacent stations.
Tardif and Maaseidvaag [19] modeled a new adaptive
kanban-type pull control mechanism which determines
when to release or when to reorder raw parts based on
customer demands, inventory and backorders using contin-
uous Markov chains.
Simulation is another tool used to analyze kanban
systems. Gupta and Gupta [20] simulated a single-item,
multi-stage dual card kanban system in order to investigate
the effect of the number of kanbans and kanban sizes on the
system performance. Sarker [21] and Savsar [22] presented
simulation models to analyze JIT systems under various
operating conditions. Andijani [23] used a stochastic
system simulation to generate the set of efficient kanban
combinations. Analytic hierarchy process (AHP) is utilized
to identify the most-preferred allocation. Sengupta et al.
[24] presented a simulation-based direct search approach in
Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977
order to determine the optimal number of kanbans. They
also studied on simultaneous allocation of kanbans to
different part types. Paris and Pierreval [4] proposed a
distributed simulation optimization method based on
evolutionary principles, which is capable of simultaneously
considering various parameters in the configuration of
multi-product kanban systems. Kochel and Nielander [25]
proposed an evolutionary optimization approach which
combines simulation and genetic algorithms in order to
find optimum number of kanbans and the volume of
containers. Shahabudeen et al. [26] used a simulated
annealing technique to select the number of production
and withdrawal kanbans at each workstation and the lot size
for each part type. They developed an object-oriented
simulation model for a multi-product, dual card dynamic
kanban system.
Some researchers have used simulation metamodeling
approaches. Aytug et al. [27] determined the number of
kanbans in a JIT system using a simulation metamodeling
approach. They developed a set of metamodels for a two-
stage kanban using regression metamodels. As mentioned
before, the use of artificial neural networks is another
effective approach for metamodeling. Hurrion [28] devel-
oped a neural network metamodel to search for the optimal
kanban combination for a two-station pull system. Savsar
and Choueiki [5] extended the study of Hurrion [28] and
proposed a generalized systematic procedure that integrates
experimental design concepts with simulation and neural
networks for solving kanban allocation problem.
3 Artificial neural network modeling
Artificial neural network is a computing architecture that is
motivated by the biological nervous systems. ANNs are
composed of a large number of simple processing elements,
all connected and in parallel. There are three basic elements
of an ANN model [29], which are illustrated in Fig. 1: (1)
Set of synapses or connected links which is represented by
a weight of its own. (2) An adder which sums the input
x1 wk1
Summing
x2 wk2
junction
Input
uk
Output
ϕ (.)
signals . Synaptic ∑ yk
. weights
Activation
. function
xm wkm
Bias
bk
Fig. 1 Non-linear model of a neuron [29]
967
signals weighted by the respective synapses of the neuron.
(3) An activation function that limits the amplitude of the
output of a neuron.
ANNs have a number of features that offer some useful
properties and capabilities. First, the ANN computations
may be carried out in parallel which allows for fast
computations. Second, ANNs can represent both linear
and non-linear relationships. Finally, ANNs have the ability
to adapt their synaptic weights to changes in the behavior of
the surrounding environment [30].
In general, two types of learning are used in ANN
models namely, supervised learning and unsupervised
learning. The ability to learn from example is one of the
most important characteristics of supervised learning. The
backpropagation (BP), which is the most widely used
supervised learning algorithm, was presented by Rumelhart
et al. [31]. In BP learning, error signals which are
calculated by subtracting the actual response of the network
from a desired response, propagated backward through the
network against the direction of synaptic connections. In
order to improve the performance of the network, the
weights are adjusted during the learning phase [29]. When
the network reaches a satisfactory level of performance, it
means that network learns the relationship between input
factors and desired outputs. Backpropagation neural net-
work is one of the most frequently used tool in simulation
metamodeling. A neural network-based simulation meta-
model is a neural network whose training set (i.e., input-
output pairs) is provided by a simulation model [32]. There
are several studies in the literature that have demonstrated
that the neural network based simulation metamodels can
be effectively used for estimation of the system perfor-
mance [7, 8, 32–36].
4 TOPSIS
TOPSIS, which was developed by Hwang and Yoon [10], is
one of the well-known MCDM techniques. The basic
concept of this method relies on the selection of the best
alternative that has the shortest distance from the ideal
solution and the farthest distance from the negative-ideal
solution. The TOPSIS method consists of the following
steps [37, 38]:
Step 1 Normalization of performance measures. This step
converts the various attribute dimensions into non-
dimensional attributes. Normalized value of ith
alternative in terms of the jth criterion (aij) is
calculated as follows:
xij
aij ¼ i ¼ 1;2;:::;m: j ¼ 1;2;:::; n: ð1Þ
maxaij
i
968 Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977

where, xij is the performance measure of the ith

alternative in terms of the jth criterion.
Step 2 Determine the ideal and the negative-ideal solutions.
The ideal aM and the negative-ideal solutions am
are defined as follows:


aM ¼ aM 1 ; :::; a M
j ; ::; a n :
M
ð2Þ

where aM j is the best value for the jth attribute

among all available alternatives. The composite of
all best attribute ratings is the ideal solution,
whereas the negative-ideal solution is composed
of all worst attribute ratings. The negative-ideal
solution am is given as


am ¼ am 1 ; ::; aj ; ::; an :
m M
ð3Þ

where am j is the worst value for the jth attribute

among all alternatives.
Step 3 Calculate the separation measure. The weighted
distances of each alternative from (aM) and (am)
are then calculated respectively, according to the
chosen metric p:
hX  p i1=p
p M 
d M pð ai Þ ¼ w
j j
a j
a ij ð4Þ

hX  p i1=p
p m 
d m p ð ai Þ ¼ w
j j
a j
a ij ð5Þ

where wj is the weight of jth criteria.

Step 4 Calculate the relative closeness (similarity ratio) to
the ideal solution. The relative closeness of ith
alternative with respect to the ideal solution aM is
defined as follows:

d m p ð ai Þ
D p ð ai Þ ¼ ð6Þ
dM p ð ai Þ þ d p ð ai Þ
m Fig. 2 The proposed methodology

This ratio varies from Dp(am)=0 for the anti-ideal

point to Dp(aM)=1 for the ideal point.
Step 5 Rank the preference order. Rank the alternatives
according to the descending order of similarity
ratio Dp(ai).
5 Proposed methodology for determining
the parameters of kanban systems
In this study, we proposed a design methodology incorpo-
rating BP neural network-based meta-modeling and TOP-
SIS multi-criteria decision making technique for
determining number of kanbans and kanban size. The flow
of this methodology is illustrated in Fig. 2.
Step 1 Selection of possible kanban combinations. First,
subject to some system constraints such as
maximum number of kanbans in a station, the set
of all possible kanban combinations is identified.
Selection of a limited set of combinations can be
made by using randomized, one-factor-at-a-time or
full factorial experimental design.
Step 2 Simulation modeling of manufacturing system. The
second step of the methodology includes building
a simulation model of JIT manufacturing system,
setting the parameters of system such as arrival
time and processing time distributions and defining
the performance measures to be evaluated. Finally,
the simulation model is run for each kanban
combinations selected in step 1.
Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977 969

Step 3 Building, training and testing of neural network station and controls production while the WK circulates
model. An ANN is built, trained and tested by between workstations and controls the material flow.
using the selected set of kanban combinations as The system under consideration is in stochastic nature
inputs and performance measures obtained by and has following assumptions:
simulation as outputs.
– An infinite supply of raw materials.
Step 4 Full enumeration: The performance measures of
– Transfer time for raw materials is 1 minute between
all possible kanban combinations are obtained by
warehouse and the input buffer of the first station.
using ANN model built in step 3.
– Transfer time for PKs is negligible.
Step 5 Evaluation of kanban combinations by using a
– Transfer time for WKs is 1 minute between workstations.
multi-criteria decision making approach. The
– The kanbans are released as soon as their containers are
performance measures conflicting in nature are
empty.
evaluated by TOPSIS approach, instead of using
– The container size is allowed to change within the
an aggregated cost function.
range [1-3].
– Including PKs and WKs, a minimum of two kanbans
In the following section, the proposed methodology will and a maximum of five kanbans can be assigned to
be applied on a case problem in order to find the optimum each station.
kanban allocations. – Demand is satisfied on FCFS rule.
The time between two successive demands is randomly
chosen according to an exponential distribution with a
6 Numerical example
mean of 11.25. Processing times are normally distributed
with a mean of 8, 10, 6 and a standard deviation of 1.15,
The manufacturing system under consideration is an
2.75, and 1.25, respectively.
assembly line composed of three workstations and produces
There are seven decision variables to be considered in
a single item. Figure 3 represents an assembly line which is
this case: WK1, PK1, WK2, PK2, WK3, PK3, CS. WKi
controlled by dual card kanban system. Each workstation
and PKi represent the number of withdrawal and production
(SN) consists of one machine, one input (IBN) and output
kanbans assigned to the workstation i, respectively. Con-
buffer (OBN). Containers which are located in input and
tainer size is denoted by CS and assumed to be same for all
output buffers are used to transport the products and one
containers in the system.
kanban is attached to each container. When the demand
In this study, four important performance measures,
arrives to output buffer of the last station, the demand is
namely average work-in process level (WIP), average
fulfilled from the output buffer. If there is no available
customer delay time (CDT), number of containers (# of
finished product in the output buffer, the demand waits until
con.), percentage of the number of tardy orders (%ntardy),
a container becomes available. The production kanban (PK)
are considered. It should be noted that the number of
is detached from the container as soon as their containers
containers is equal to the number of kanbans.
are empty. The detached PK is sent to the input buffer of
A JIT manufacturing system is expected to respond
the station to start the production providing that there are
quickly to demand with minimum average WIP. Customer
available materials in the input buffer. At this time,
delay time and the WIP levels are in conflicting nature. In
withdrawal kanban (WK) and emptied container are sent to
other words the lower the WIP levels, the higher the
the output buffer of the preceding workstation and replaced
average customers delay time and vice versa. However
with a full one. This process continues throughout the whole
minimization of the average WIP is also necessary.
preceding stations. The PK always circulates within the
Additionally, if demand has not been met in time it causes

Fig. 3 N-station dual-card kan- WK1 PK1 WK2 PK2 WK PKN

ban system [40]

S1 SN
WH S2

IB1 OB1 IB2 OB2 IBN

Raw Finished
Material Product
Warehouse Buffer
Flow of parts and Kanban
Flow of Kanban
970
dissatisfaction for the customer. In the same manner, the
number of tardy orders is another critical performance
measure for JIT systems even if the average customer delay
time is low. Moreover, the number of containers should be
decreased for reducing material handling cost. It is clear that
other performance measures can be added with respect to the
characteristic of the manufacturing system considered.
According to the manufacturing system constraints, the
number of kanban combinations for each station is 10 as
seen in Table 1. Additionally, container size can take values
between 1 and 3. Thus the total number of kanban
combinations to be simulated is 10×10×10×3=3,000.
Simulating 3,000 combinations (15 replications) requires
approximately 150 hours. A neural network-based meta-
model requires much less time than the related simulation
model to generate the simulation outputs.
Considering the above system, the optimum number of
kanbans for each work station and the optimum container size
are determined using the proposed methodology as in follows:
Step 1 In this step, the set of all possible kanban
combinations was identified considering some
system constraints such as maximum number of
kanbans in a station. Among 3,000 possible
combinations, 400 combinations were selected
using randomized experimental design.
Step 2 The simulation model of three station JIT
production line was constructed using ARENA
10.0 Simulation Software and run for each
combinations selected in Step 1.The replication
length was chosen as 35,000 minutes with a
warm-up period of 5,000 minutes. The variance
reduction technique of common random numbers
[39] is used for synchronization of random
numbers so that the combinations are compared
under similar conditions. Fifteen replications
were made for each combination and the average
WIP levels, percentage of number of tardy orders
and customer delay times were computed.
Step 3 After obtaining the corresponding performance
measures for 400 kanban combinations, we built a
multilayer feed-forward neural network model for
each performance measure as illustrated in Fig. 4.
Table 1 Total kanban combinations
WKi PKi
1 1, 2, 3, 4
2 1, 2, 3
3 1, 2
4 1
Total number of combinations for each workstation 10
Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977
A feed-forward architecture including one layer of
hidden units has been employed for each performance
measure. WK1, PK1, WK2, PK2, WK3, PK3 and CS were
introduced as input nodes.
The performance of neural network depends on several
design parameters such as number of hidden layers, the
number of nodes in the hidden layer, the type of transfer
function, learning rate, momentum rate, etc. In general,
identification of these design parameters is done by trial
and error [5]. Using trial and error method, we set the
design parameters in Table 2.
For neural network model, 300 and 50 input-output pairs
were randomly taken and used for training and cross
validation, respectively. When the number of learning
epochs is larger than 10,000 or the mean square error is
less than 0.0001 the learning process stops. The remaining
50 combinations were used for testing.
The mean square error was used as the measure of
accuracy of the neural network. Figure 5 displays the
simulation and neural network results of test data.
As seen in Fig. 5, the neural network model provides
accurate estimates for customer delay time, WIP levels and
percentage of number of tardy orders. Table 3 shows some
measure of accuracy such as mean square error; mean
absolute error and root mean square error. Although the
accuracy measures show that artificial neural network
models have good performance for all performance mea-
sures, we compared artificial neural network metamodels
and regression metamodels with respect to their deviations
from the simulation results.
The quadratic regression model was fitted using the
training set data (300 examples) of neural network model.
In the comparison, the test data set (50 examples) of the
neural network models was used. According to the results
in Table 3, one can conclude that, for the problem
considered, the neural network models give better results
in terms of all performance measures.
Step 4 The average WIP levels, percentage of number of
tardy orders and average customer delay times for
each kanban combination were obtained by using
the neural network model built in step 3. The
fourth performance measure, number of containers,
is equal to total number of kanban since one
kanban is attached to each container.
Step 5 After obtaining performance measures for all
kanban combinations, TOPSIS technique was
used in order to choose optimum kanban combi-
nation considering the relative importance of the
performance measures. All of these performance
measures were wanted to be minimized.
Firstly, all data are normalized between 0 and 1.
Secondly, ideal and anti-ideal points for all criteria were
Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977 971

Fig. 4 Neural network model of

the JIT manufacturing system

WK1

PK1

WK2 Performance
Measures
PK2

WK3 Output Layer

PK3

CS

Input Layer Hidden Layer

identified as shown in Table 4. Thirdly, the weighted
euclidean distances (p=2) d2M ðaiÞ and d2m ðaiÞ to the ideal
and anti-ideal points were computed from Eqs. (4) and (5).
At the fourth step, similarity ratio is calculated from Eq. (6).
Finally, the ranking of the alternatives was obtained
according to the descending order of similarity ratio D2(ai).
We assumed that the customer delay time has the highest
priority among all measures. In order to reflect the relative
importance of performance measures for different decision
makers (DM), different weight structures were generated.
For given set of weights, the alternative with the highest Dp
was chosen. Table 5 shows the alternative solutions
according to DM’s point of view.
As seen in Table 5, if customer delay time is used as a
sole criterion for choice, the alternative (2-3-1-4-2-3-3) for
(WK1, PK1, WK2, PK2, WK3, PK3 and CS) is selected.
This alternative has maximum number of kanbans (15) and
maximum container size (3) and provides minimum
customer delay time. It should also be noted in Table 5
that when the weight of customer delay time is decreased,
the alternatives which have lower container size and fewer
kanbans are chosen. It causes an improvement on the WIP
performance.
Furthermore, for a given weight structure, there are
several solutions that have close TOPSIS similarity ratio
Table 2 Design parameters of neural network
Design parameters %ntardy CDT WIP
Number of hidden layer 1 1 1 values of these measures.
Number of nodes in hidden layer 8 9 8 Using the proposed methodology and considering the
Learning rate 0.1 0.1 0.1
Momentum rate 0.7 0.7 0.7
Transfer function Hyperbolic tangent
with the optimum solution. All of the solutions seen in
Table 6 were obtained for the weight structure (0.8, 0.1,
0.05, 0.05) and can be chosen to implement, since all of
them provides very close performances on all criteria. It is
obvious that a decision maker can find different solutions
by using different weight structure that reflects her/his
preferences.
6.1 Illustrative experiments and results
As mentioned before, allocation of kanbans to the stations
is a complex manufacturing design problem due to the
variations in demand, processing times and product types.
In order to show the effectiveness of the proposed
methodology, we performed several experiments on differ-
ent types of problems in the next subsections.
6.1.1 Experiment 1–effect of changing in problem size
In the first experiment, the proposed methodology is
applied on two problem instances with different sizes; four
and five workstations, respectively. The same assumptions
given in previous section have been used for each problem
case. Tables 7 and 8 show the processing times and the
networks design parameters, respectively.
Some measure of accuracy such as mean square error;
mean absolute error and root mean square error were also
calculated for each instance in order to show the accuracy
of the neural network models trained. Table 9 gives the
same weight structure, we determined the optimum kanban
allocation for these two problem instances. The results are
given in Table 10. It can be seen from the results that the
972 Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977

Fig. 5 Simulation and neural % ntardy WIP

network results of test data 35
1
30
0.8
25
0.6 20
15
0.4
10
0.2 5
0 0
1 5 9 13 17 21 25 29 33 37 41 45 49 1 4 7 10 13 16 19 22 25 28 31 34 37 40 43 46 49
Simulation Results Simulation Results
ANN Results ANN Results

CDT
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
1 4 7 10 13 16 19 22 25 28 31 34 37 40 43 46 49
Simulation Results
ANN Results

procedure gives reasonable solutions for each case. For
example, for 5-workstation instance with weight structure
of (0.8, 0.1, 0.05, 0.05), the optimum solution is the kanban
combination (1,1,1,1,1,4,1,4,1,4,2) for (WK1, PK1, WK2,
PK2, WK3, PK3, WK4, PK4, WK5, PK5 and CS). The
associated customer delay time is 1.379 while the average
WIP level is 24.1715. When the weight of WIP is increased
by 0.1 (from 0.1 to 0.2) and the weight of customer delay
time is decreased by 0.2 (from 0.8 to 0.6), the performance
of customer delay time is deteriorated while WIP level is
decreased. In this case, the total number of kanban is
decreased from 19 to 17 in order to increase WIP
performance.
Furthermore, it should also be noted in Table 9 that
although the number of decision variables and the number
of possible kanban combinations are increased in some
extend, artificial neural network models gives accurate
results for each performance measure in a reasonable time.
6.1.2 Experiment 2–effect of increasing the number
of products
In this experiment, the three-workstation case is again used.
However, it is assumed that production line can handle
three different types of product, A, B, and C. In this case,
each part type has its own production and withdrawal
kanbans. In addition to the base case assumptions,
following assumptions are also considered:
– The size of container is the same everywhere and fixed
at two for each product type.
– Including PKs and WKs, a minimum of six kanbans
and a maximum of eight kanbans can be assigned to
each station for all product types.
– Each type of job has its own demand interarrival time
distribution.
– All the jobs are processed in all three stations.

Table 3 Some measure of accuracy for%ntardy, CDT and WIP Levels (MSE: mean square error; RMSE=root mean square error) for ANN and
regression model

ANN Regression

Error measure %ntardy CDT WIP %ntardy CDT WIP

Mean absolute error 0.0047 0.179 0.125 0.123 1.412 0.855

% Absolute error 3.582 2.151 0.886 17.34 25.99 7.20
MSE 3.862e–05 0.056 0.037 0.025 3.716 1.432
RMSE 0.006 0.236 0.194 0.158 1.928 1.197
Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977 973

Table 4 Ideal and anti-ideal points for all criteria number of containers and container size. This is probably
Criteria Ideal points Anti-ideal points because the procedure increases the number of kanbans
(and number of containers) in order to decrease the
%ntardy 0.0106 1 customer delay time. In the same manner, when demand
CDT 0.0384 1 inter-arrival time is low, the number of tardy orders is
WIP 0.1116 1
increased because of an imbalance between production and
# of con. 0.4000 1
demand rates.

The processing times and demands inter arrival distri-

butions of each product type are given in Table 11.
Here, there are 18 decision variables (WKim, PKim
where i represents number of stations and m represents
product type ) to be considered. Therefore the total number
of kanban combinations was increased to 21,952. Ten
percent of the total combinations was selected for training
and testing. The network parameters given in Table 2 were
also used for the multi-product case. Some accuracy
measures of neural network models are given in Table 12.
The results show that neural network models are capable of
estimating the performance measures accurately for multi-
product case either. The optimum kanban allocation for the
multi-product case is given in Table 13.
It should be noted in Table 13 that, in all the solutions,
the number of production kanbans of product A at the
output buffer of the last station is higher than the others. It
is probably due to the output buffer of the last station serves
as a buffer in meeting the demand and the product A has
the highest demand arrival rate.
6.1.3 Experiment 3–effect of demand variation
In this experiment we considered the effect of the variation
of the demand on the performance measures. To study the
effect of this factor on the proposed procedure, the base
case (with three station, single product) was considered
with two different demand patterns of EXPO(10.25) and
EXPO(12.25). For each instance, the proposed methodol-
ogy was applied to find the optimum number of kanbans.
The results are given in Tables 14 and 15.
As can be seen from the Tables 14 and 15, any decrease
in the demand inter-arrival time causes an increase in the
7 Concluding remarks and future research
Determining the number of kanbans and the container size is
a critical decision for JIT manufacturing systems. Because of
the complex nature of such systems, generally simulation
models are used to evaluate the possible design alternatives.
However simulation may become a cumbersome process
when the number of alternatives to be evaluated is increased.
It is also difficult to evaluate alternative solutions when there
is more than one performance measure to be considered.
Generally, a cost function is used as aggregated weighted
function, in order to evaluate all possible kanban combina-
tions with respect to the objective function. However, in real
life, construction of the cost function is a difficult task
because of incommensurable nature of some performance
measures such as average customer delay time, maximum
customer delay time.
In this study, we proposed a methodology for determin-
ing the optimal number of kanbans for each station and the
optimal container size for whole manufacturing system. In
this methodology, a backpropagation neural network is
used in order to generate simulation meta-models, and a
multi-criteria decision making technique (TOPSIS) is
employed to evaluate kanban combinations considering
the priorities of the decision maker. The proposed method-
ology is applied to a case problem and the results are
presented. We also performed several experiments on
different types of problems to show the effects of problem
size, variations in demand and types of products on the
effectiveness of the methodology. The results show that the
proposed methodology can solve the kanban allocation
problem effectively and efficiently.

Table 5 Optimum solutions for different set of weights

Weights Alternatives Criteria

CDT WIP # of con. %ntardy WK1 PK1 WK2 PK2 WK3 PK3 CS %ntardy CDT WIP # of con.

0.25 0.25 0.25 0.25 1 1 1 1 1 3 3 0.142 8.353 11.302 8

0.4 0.2 0.2 0.2 1 1 1 1 1 4 3 0.079 5.087 13.639 9
0.6 0.2 0.1 0.1 1 1 1 4 2 3 2 0.068 3.450 14.180 12
0.8 0.1 0.05 0.05 1 1 1 4 1 3 3 0.024 2.115 19.231 11
1 0 0 0 2 3 1 4 2 3 3 0.013 1.329 30.699 15
974 Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977

Table 6 First 6 alternative solutions according to weight structure (0.8, 0.1, 0.05, 0.05) (SR: similarity ratio)

Weights Alternatives Criteria SR

CDT WIP # of % WK1 PK1 WK2 PK2 WK3 PK3 CS % CDT WIP # of
con. ntardy ntardy con.

0.8 0.1 0.05 0.05 1 1 1 4 1 3 3 0.024 2.115 19.231 11 0.931

0.8 0.1 0.05 0.05 1 1 1 3 2 3 3 0.024 2.113 19.246 11 0.931
0.8 0.1 0.05 0.05 1 1 1 3 1 4 3 0.025 2.378 19.086 11 0.928
0.8 0.1 0.05 0.05 1 1 1 4 1 4 3 0.009 1.589 22.029 12 0.924
0.8 0.1 0.05 0.05 1 1 1 4 2 3 3 0.014 1.379 22.254 12 0.924
0.8 0.1 0.05 0.05 1 1 1 3 1 3 3 0.046 3.277 16.414 10 0.921

Table 7 The distributions of processing times for 4 and 5 machine cases

Station1 Station2 Station3 Station4 Station5

4 machine cases Normal (8,1.15) Normal (10,2.75) Normal (6,1.25) Normal (7,1.25) –
5 machine cases Normal (8,1.15) Normal (10,2.75) Normal (6,1.25) Normal (7,1.25) Normal (6,1.25)

Table 8 Design parameters of neural network model for 4 and 5 machine cases

Design parameters 4 machine case 5 machine case

%ntardy CDT WIP %ntardy CDT WIP

Number of hidden Layer 1 1 1 1 1 1

Number of nodes in hidden layer 28 28 18 40 40 20
Learning rate 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1
Momentum rate 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7
Total number of alternative 30,000 30,000 30,000 30,0000 30,0000 30,0000
The number of training set data 2,400 2,400 2,400 4,000 4,000 4,000
The number of test set data 300 300 300 500 500 500
The number of cross validation set data 300 300 300 500 500 500

Table 9 Some measure of accuracy for performance measures

Error measure 4 machine case 5 machine case

%ntardy CDT WIP %ntardy CDT WIP

Mean absolute error 0.039 0.441 0.222 0.003 0.324 0.278

% Absolute error 4.016 3.018 1.77 5.38 10.38 1.75
MSE 0.002 0.002 0.003 0.0001 0.0002 0.0002
RMSE 0.013 0.052 0.055 0.011 0.0133 0.0130
Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977 975

# of con
Table 11 The distributions of interarrival time and processing times
for multi-product case

12
14
13
17

13
12
17
19
23
11
Type A Type B Type C
Arrival rate Expo(14.5) Expo(22) Expo(50)

13.855
19.046
20.492
24.715
50.456
12.53
15.85
22.35
34.58
11.07
WIP

Processing times
Station1 Normal Normal Normal
(8,1.15) (5,1.25) (6,1.25)

8.727
5.136
2.872
1.379
0.662
CDT

9.62
7.78
4.93
2.81
0.17
Station2 Normal Normal Normal
(10, 2.75) (4,1.2) (4, 2.25)
Criteria

Station3 Normal Normal Normal

0.081
0.055
0.035
0.021
0.037
0.08
0.05
0.05
0.03
0.11

(6,1.25) (3,1.15) (5, 2.25)

%nt
CS

2
2
2
3
3

2
3
2
2
3 Since the proposed methodology is based on ANNs, it
PK5

inherits all the disadvantages of ANNs. First, the construc-

–
–
–
–
–

3
3
4
4
3

tion of training set becomes difficult when the problem size

is increased. Second, determining the optimum levels of
WK5

ANNs parameters such as number of processing elements,

–
–
–
–
–

1
1
1
1
2

number of hidden layers, learning rate, momentum rate, etc.

is also difficult. Third, ANN models should be retrained
PK4

4
4
4
3
3

2
1
2
4
3

when the system state parameters change.

Besides these disadvantages, the use of ANNs provide
WK4

quick and accurate estimates for kanban allocation and the

1
1
1
1
2

1
1
2
1
2

use of TOPSIS allows one to evaluate alternative solutions

Table 10 Optimum solutions for different set of weights for 4 and 5 machine cases (%nt:%ntardy)

considering multiple objectives with respect to the decision

PK3

maker’s preferences. So far, the results of the proposed

1
1
1
1
3

1
1
3
4
3

methodology are promising; however, further research is

required in the following directions. First, the production
WK3

system state parameters (such as number of machines,

1
1
4
4
2

1
1
1
1
2

demand rate, etc.) can be considered as input parameters of

PK2

the ANN models and the methodology can be used for re-
1
2
1
1
4

1
1
1
1
4

allocation of kanbans in a dynamic manner. Second,

different multi-criteria decision-making techniques such as
WK2

Promethee, Electre, etc. can be employed instead of

1
1
1
1
1

1
1
1
1
1

TOPSIS. Third, the effectiveness of the proposed method-

ology can be investigated for different kanban based
PK1

production control systems such as CONWIP, hybrid

Alternatives

1
1
1
1
1

1
1
1
1
2

systems, etc. Fourth, the optimum parameters of ANNs

can be determined by using some metaheuristic approaches
WK1

such as genetic algorithms, tabu search, etc.

1
1
1
1
1

1
1
1
1
1
0.25

0.05

0.25

0.05
%nt

0.2
0.1

0.2
0.1
0

0
#of con.

Table 12 Some measure of accuracy for performance measures–

multiproduct case
0.25

0.05

0.25

0.05
0.2
0.1

0.2
0.1
0

Error measure %ntardy CDT WIP

4 machine case

5 machine case
WIP

0.25

0.25
0.2
0.2
0.1

0.2
0.2
0.1

Mean absolute error 0.007 1.153 0.219

0

% absolute error 1.346 2.409 0.652

Weights

MSE 0.0003 4.656 0.066

0.25

0.25
CDT

0.4
0.6
0.8

0.4
0.6
0.8

RMSE 0.016 2.157 0.257

1

1
976 Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977

Table 13 Optimum solutions for different set of weights for multi-product case

Weights Alternatives Criteria

CDT WIP # of % WK1A ,PK1A, WK1B, PK1B, WK1C, PK1C, WK2A, PK2A, WK2B, % CDT WIP # of
con. ntardy PK2B, WK2C, PK2C, WK3A, PK3A, WK3B, PK3B, WK3C, PK3C ntardy con.

0.25 0.25 0.25 0.25 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 1 0.3049 31.221 27.227 22

0.4 0.2 0.2 0.2 1, 1, 1, 2, 1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 1, 1, 1, 1 0.3504 29.465 27.723 22
0.6 0.2 0.1 0.1 1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 1, 1, 1, 1 0.3483 25.375 29.301 23
0.8 0.1 0.05 0.05 1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 1, 1, 1, 1 0.3483 25.371 29.301 23
1 0 0 0 1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 1 0.3047 24.761 30.147 24

Table 14 Optimum solutions for different set of weights for arrival rate 10.25

Weights Alternatives Criteria

CDT WIP # of con. %ntardy WK1 PK1 WK2 PK2 WK3 PK3 CS %ntardy CDT WIP # of con.

0.25 0.25 0.25 0.25 1 1 1 1 1 4 3 0.641 165.852 7.622 9

0.4 0.2 0.2 0.2 1 1 1 4 1 3 3 0.523 130.805 9.813 11
0.6 0.2 0.1 0.1 1 1 1 4 1 4 3 0.498 118.859 11.104 12
0.8 0.1 0.05 0.05 1 1 1 4 2 3 3 0.493 118.817 11.182 12
1 0 0 0 1 3 1 4 2 3 3 0.491 116.825 17.386 14

Table 15 Optimum solutions for different set of weights for arrival rate 12.25

Weights Alternatives Criteria

CDT WIP # of con. %ntardy WK1 PK1 WK2 PK2 WK3 PK3 CS %ntardy CDT WIP # of con.

0.25 0.25 0.25 0.25 1 1 1 2 1 3 2 0.065 2.905 10.119 9

0.4 0.2 0.2 0.2 1 1 1 2 1 3 3 0.027 1.408 15.645 9
0.6 0.2 0.1 0.1 1 1 1 2 1 3 3 0.027 1.408 15.645 9
0.8 0.1 0.05 0.05 1 1 1 3 2 3 3 0.004 0.166 21.637 11
1 0 0 0 1 4 1 4 2 3 3 0.000 0.022 33.161 15
Int J Adv Manuf Technol (2008) 38:965–977
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