Consider a four-station line in which all stations consists of single machines. Station 2 has average processing times of 2 hours per job, while the remaining stations have average processing times of 1 hour per job. Answer the following, under the assumption that process times are deterministic (as in the best case).
a) What are rb and To for this line?
b) How do rb and To change if a second identical machine is added to station 2? What effects will this have on performace?
c) How do rb and To change if the machine at station 2 is speeded up to have average processing times of 1 hour? What effects will this have on performance?
d) How do rb and To change if a second, identical machine is added to station 1? What effects will this have on performance?
e) How do rb and To change if the machine at station 1 is speeded up to have average processing times of 1/2 hour? What effects will this have on performance? Do your results agree or disagree with the statement "An hour saved at a nonbottleneck is a mirage (i. e., of no value)"?