A simulation based analysis of production scheduling in a steelmaking and continuous casting plant

This paper focuses on the modeling and analysis of complex production systems such as Steelmaking Continuous Casting (SM-CC) plants. To this aim, the discrete event simulation is employed to verify the dynamics and the performance of the SM-CC systems. First, the manufacturing system activities are described in detail by the Unified Modeling Language (UML). Then, the UML activity diagrams are translated in a discrete event simulation model. Hence, a real system involving a SM-CC plant located in Italy is considered and analyzed. Some simulation results show that the proposed modeling and analysis approach can be effectively used to improve and assess the performance of the system.