Repetitive schemes for the single-machine multi-product lot-size scheduling problem

Solution of the single-machine multi-product lot-size scheduling problem requires the interactive optimization of the cycle times for individual products and the scheduling of the cycles. Usually one presents procedures of the following form. Start by finding the best individual cycle times which satisfy some restrictions. Secondly, try to find an appropriate schedule (which does not exist necessarily) for the production cycles. In this paper we will present solutions which do not require extensive scheduling. Actually, our repetitive schemes may be seen as generalizations of the purely rotational scheme. For the case of two homogeneous groups of products a systematic comparison of our solution with lower bounds for the costs is given. For some problems in the literature our solutions are compared with other solutions.