Analysis of the Variability of the Output from Production Systems

We consider production systems that can be modeled as Markov chains. A methodology to determine the exact distribution of the number of parts produced by a production system during a fixed time interval and also the exact distribution of the time to produce a given number of parts is presented. These distributions can beused to set due-dates according to the desired service level, to evaluate the due-time performance of production systems, and to derive other performance measures related to the variability of the output.