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Frontiers of Mechanical Engineering >> 2016, Volume 11, Issue 3 doi: 10.1007/s11465-016-0384-z

Branch-pipe-routing approach for ships using improved genetic algorithm

Key Laboratory of Mechanism Theory and Equipment Design of Ministry of Education, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China

Accepted: 2016-05-25 Available online: 2016-08-31

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Abstract

Branch-pipe routing plays fundamental and critical roles in ship-pipe design. The branch-pipe-routing problem is a complex combinatorial optimization problem and is thus difficult to solve when depending only on human experts. A modified genetic-algorithm-based approach is proposed in this paper to solve this problem. The simplified layout space is first divided into three-dimensional (3D) grids to build its mathematical model. Branch pipes in layout space are regarded as a combination of several two-point pipes, and the pipe route between two connection points is generated using an improved maze algorithm. The coding of branch pipes is then defined, and the genetic operators are devised, especially the complete crossover strategy that greatly accelerates the convergence speed. Finally, simulation tests demonstrate the performance of proposed method.

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