New constructive algorithms for leather nesting in the automotive industry

Optimizing Leather Cutting Process in Make-to-Order Production to Increase Hide Utilization

“…Nesting is defined as "where more than one piece of irregular shape must be placed in a configuration with the other piece(s) in order to optimize an objective" [14]. The Leather Nesting Problem is one of the hardest two-dimensional cutting problems [9]. It allocates a set of irregular shapes within natural leather hides with highly irregular contours and heterogeneous interior due to holes and quality zones, in order to utilize most of the leather hide [9,15].…”

“…The Leather Nesting Problem is one of the hardest two-dimensional cutting problems [9]. It allocates a set of irregular shapes within natural leather hides with highly irregular contours and heterogeneous interior due to holes and quality zones, in order to utilize most of the leather hide [9,15]. Traditionally the nesting process is performed manually and results in low nesting efficiency and utilization rate of the material [13].…”

“…Because the range of defects is wide and various, automated defect detectors are still inefficient in identifying and evaluating the whole range of defects [23,24]. Experienced workers can evaluate the defects best and assign them to five different quality categories of A, B, C, D and holes [9]. Scanning the hide reproduces an image with the contour of the hide.…”

“…The efficient utilization of the leather hide has prime importance [7], which can be attributed to the fact that the cost of the leather hide often constitutes a significant pro-portion of the manufacturing costs, such that increasing its utilization provides significant cost savings [8,9]. As a result, there have been a lot of attention in the leather industry to improve the nesting algorithms for determining how to fit variety of products onto hides [9][10][11]. Existing research have focused on developing algorithms that can determine the best possible ways to fit irregular product shapes and characteristics on raw hides, in order to achieve the best possible hide utilization within the shortest time possible [6,9].…”

“…As a result, there have been a lot of attention in the leather industry to improve the nesting algorithms for determining how to fit variety of products onto hides [9][10][11]. Existing research have focused on developing algorithms that can determine the best possible ways to fit irregular product shapes and characteristics on raw hides, in order to achieve the best possible hide utilization within the shortest time possible [6,9].…”