Push and pull disassembly quantity models in a reverse supply chain: the case of an automobile disassembly system in Korea

This paper considers the problem of deciding disassembly order quantity in a disassembly system. Returned end-of-use/life (EOL) products are disassembled to retrieve reusable parts sold to secondary markets. For the problem, we suggest novel push and pull disassembly policy models by extending reverse economic order quantity models. The objective of the models is to minimise the costs of the disassembly setup, the disassembly operations and inventory holding, the scrapping of non-reusable parts, and backorder. We develop optimal equations and algorithms for the models and perform a case study of Korean automobile disassembly systems. We then conduct a series of sensitivity analyses based on real-world and reliable data and discuss possible applications of the push and pull policies. The results show that the pull policy gives better in terms of the total cost while the push policy is less insensitive to the disassembly setup cost.