Dual‐ascent and primal heuristics for production‐assembly‐distribution system design

This article proposes two dual‐ascent algorithms and uses each in combination with a primal drop heuristic embedded within a branch and bound framework to solve the uncapacitated production assembly distribution system (i.e., supply chain) design problem, which is formulated as a mixed integer program. Computational results indicate that one approach, which combines primal drop and dual‐ascent heuristics, can solve instances within reasonable time and prescribes solutions with gaps between the primal and dual solution values that are less than 0.15%, an efficacy suiting it for actual large‐scale applications. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2013     

A comparison of usage data among types of aircraft

It has long been an accepted proposition that base level usage df technical repair items for aircraft is related to program elements. The program element most often cited in this connection is flying hours. Evidence of this relationship on a line item basis, however, has been sparse. This study suggests that although the supposed relation is intuitively plausible, for most line items it cannot be effectively utilized in projecting base level requirements. The basis of this conclusion is an analysis of demand characteristics for technical repair items for a variety of naval aircraft.     

Scheduling workers in a constricted area

A generalization of the equi-partitioning problem, termed the 2D-Partition Problem, is formulated. The motivation is an aircraft maintenance scheduling problem with the following characteristics. The complete maintenance overhaul of a single aircraft requires the completion of some 350 tasks. These tasks require a varying number of technicians working at the same time. For large subsets of these 350 tasks, the constraining resource is physical space—tasks must be completed in a physical space of limited size such as the cockpit. Furthermore, there is no precedence relationship among the tasks. For each subset, the problem is to schedule the tasks to minimize makespan. Let m denote the maximum number of technicians that can work at the same time in the physical area under consideration. We present optimization algorithms for m = 2 and 3. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Robustness of preallocated preferential defense with assumed attack size and perfect attacking and defending weapons

The problem is to protect a set of t targets by n perfect interceptors against an attack by m perfect weapons. If the defender solves for an optimal preallocated preferential defense and associated game value assuming m₁ attackers, and the attacker knows the assumption of the defender and utilizes m₂ attackers, he may be able to achieve significantly more damage than had the defender assumed that there would be m₂ attackers. The article treats the robustness of preallocated preferential defense to assumptions about the size of the attack and presents results of an alternative approach.