A Simulation-Based Study for Central Fill Pharmacy System Conveyor Layout Improvement

Advanced manufacturing facilities utilize highly automated material handling systems such as conveyor belts for transporting large volumes of resources within the facility. However, as the systems scale up and complexity increases, constructing a conveyor network to satisfy the design and operational needs and constraints is a challenging task that needs to be carefully evaluated before physical implementation to avoid unnecessary investment. Such challenges inspire us to conduct a simulation-based study evaluating different conveyor layout solutions. This study aims to evaluate different layout designs and look for optimized, economical, and reliable conveyor belt designs while enhancing the productivity and efficiency of the system operations. General design principles are proposed to assist in designing future systems. In this study, an advanced automation system, Central Fill Pharmacy (CFP) systems, is considered as a case study to show how to improve the conveyor layout that connects multiple processing units such as Autofill, SmartCollator, and packing stations for automating the distribution of vials, bottles, and totes. Several experiments were conducted using Demo 3D simulation software to evaluate the performance measures for the previous and proposed conveyor system layouts. The tested Key Performance Measures (KPIs) are conveyor utilization, cycle time, equipment cost, and the maximum number of items on each conveyor belt section at any time during a work shift. The experimental results show that the proposed layout will enhance conveyor utilization and reduce the equipment cost and cycle time while maintaining the ability to deliver the same system throughput. Furthermore, design principles are summarized and presented at the end of the paper.