Intelligent selective disassembly using the ant colony algorithm

Selective disassembly is an important issue in industrial and mechanical engineering for environmentally conscious manufacturing. This paper presents an intelligent selective disassembly approach based on ant colony algorithms, which take inspiration from the behavior of real ant colonies and are used to solve combinatorial optimization problems. For diverse assemblies, the algorithm generates different amounts of ants cooperating to find disassembly sequences for selected components, minimizing the reorientation of assemblies and removal of components. A candidate list that is composed of feasible disassembly operations, which are derived from a disassembly matrix of products, guides sequence construction in the implicit solution space and ensures the geometric feasibility of sequences. Preliminary implementation results show the effectiveness of the proposed method.

The Disassembly Matrix for Computer-Aided Disassembly

This study proposes an effective and feasible method that improves the existing methods for disassembly. The elements of three dimensional interference matrices in the directions of x, y and z axes are considered as the low bit, middle bit and high bit, respectively, for the elements of the proposed disassembly matrix in the binary system. By using the Boolean operation and the deep-first-search method, the algorithm is developed and a software program is generated to create all of the possible disassembly sequences and directions of components in the tree diagram. With the grades for change of the disassembly directions, the optimum disassembly sequences can be determined. This disassembly matrix not only can help disassemble the disposed devices but also can evaluate the potential products during design.