ABSTRACT
It is well known that deadlock may occur due to limited resources in flexible manufacturing systems (FMS), leading to a system-wide standstill. One type of limited resources is caused by the competition by parts for the manufacturing resources, such as machines, buffers, and the material handling system (MHS). It occurs during the part processing. The other type is due to the competition for nodes and lanes by automated guided vehicles (AGVs) when multiple AGVs are used in MHS. The deadlock issue in part production processes has been discussed in the previous chapters. This chapter discusses a deadlock avoidance problem in AGV systems.
