Optimum Design of Ship Cabin Equipment Layout Based on SLP Method and Genetic Algorithm

The engine room is the heart of a ship, and almost all of the main electromechanical equipment that supports the work on board can be found here. Finding a way to arrange the equipment in a small cabin space is an essential factor in the design and construction of a ship. However, in existing research, when an intelligent algorithm is used to optimize the design of a cabin, the established mathematical model is not comprehensive and the solution has not been evaluated. The optimal solution obtained is not feasible for the actual design of a ship. This can lead to unnecessary redesign work, which seriously affects design efficiency and increases design costs. In order to solve the above problems, this paper innovatively refers to a Systematic Layout Planning (SLP) method (normally applied to the layout of plant equipment) to the cabin equipment layout issue. The SLP method is used to quantitatively analyze the adjacency and logistics relationship between devices, and the mutual integration relationship between devices is obtained so that a preliminary layout scheme can be retrieved. The problem model is constructed by considering various factors such as the comprehensive relationship between the equipment and the stability of the cabin, and the corresponding objective function and constraint function are established to further design the variables, operators, and steps of the genetic algorithm. The initial solution obtained from the SLP method is used as part of an initial solution to the genetic algorithm, and the genetic algorithm is used to optimize the problem. Finally, the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) is used to evaluate and optimize several groups of better schemes obtained by running multiple genetic algorithms and select the better schemes. The experimental design proves that the integrated design method has certain feasibility and superiority.