Rapid manufacturing as a tool for agile manufacturing: applications and implementation perspectives

Manufacturing engineers and technologists around the globe are already well familiar with manufacturing methodologies and systems developments in the last part of the twentieth century. Many are probably also familiar with the current state of Rapid Prototyping (RP) technologies, especially in the areas of concept model making and prototype development. They may not however, be so familiar with the more recent developments of these technologies towards Rapid Manufacturing (RM) and the directions which the applications of RM technologies are taking for agile manufacturing purposes in particular. This paper critically reviews the various technologies currently available, outlines development trends in RM, discusses the approach, application and implementation perspectives by which these RM technologies are applied for increasing agility and responsiveness in manufacturing. Furthermore, the paper describes two case study examples to further illustrate the application scenarios in agile manufacturing before concluding remarks

AI and OR in management of operations: history and trends

The last decade has seen a considerable growth in the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) for operations management with the aim of finding solutions to problems that are increasing in complexity and scale. This paper begins by setting the context for the survey through a historical perspective of OR and AI. An extensive survey of applications of AI techniques for operations management, covering a total of over 1200 papers published from 1995 to 2004 is then presented. The survey utilizes Elsevier's ScienceDirect database as a source. Hence, the survey may not cover all the relevant journals but includes a sufficiently wide range of publications to make it representative of the research in the field. The papers are categorized into four areas of operations management: (a) design, (b) scheduling, (c) process planning and control and (d) quality, maintenance and fault diagnosis. Each of the four areas is categorized in terms of the AI techniques used: genetic algorithms, case-based reasoning, knowledge-based systems, fuzzy logic and hybrid techniques. The trends over the last decade are identified, discussed with respect to expected trends and directions for future work suggested

A Layered Software Architecture for the Management of a Manufacturing Company

In this paper we describe a layered software architecture in the management of a manufactur-ing company that intensively uses computer technology. Application tools, new and legacy, after the updating, operate in a context of an open web oriented architecture. The software architecture enables the integration and interoperability among all tools that support business processes. Manufacturing Executive System and Text Mining tools are excellent interfaces, the former both for internal production and management processes and the latter for external processes coming from the market. In this way, it is possible to implement, a computer integrated factory, flexible and agile, that immediately responds to customer requirements.ICT, Service Oriented Architecture, Web Services, Computer-Integrated Factory, Application Software

Product to process lifecycle management in assembly automation systems

Presently, the automotive industry is facing enormous pressure due to global competition and ever changing legislative, economic and customer demands. Product and process development in the automotive manufacturing industry is a challenging task for many reasons. Current product life cycle management (PLM) systems tend to be product-focussed. Though, information about processes and resources are there but mostly linked to the product. Process is an important aspect, especially in assembly automation systems that link products to their manufacturing resources. This paper presents a process-centric approach to improve PLM systems in large-scale manufacturing companies, especially in the powertrain sector of the automotive industry. The idea is to integrate the information related to key engineering chains i.e. products, processes and resources based upon PLM philosophy and shift the trend of product-focussed lifecycle management to process-focussed lifecycle management, the outcome of which is the Product, Process and Resource Lifecycle Management not PLM only

An introduction of small-scale intelligent manufacturing system

Embargoed OA, manuscript version after 24 months from publishing date. Link to publishers version: http://doi.org/10.1109/SIMS.2016.7802896Manufacturing companies in Northern Peripheral and Arctic region are predominately small and medium-sized and face considerable challenges like geographical isolation and a lack of benefits offered by industrial clusters. For the ultimate goal of enhancing their competitiveness in a global market, it is imperative for companies to innovate or adopt innovations in order to quickly response to changes in market, meet customer demands, reduce time-to-market and lower cost. A novel concept for small-scale intelligent manufacturing systems (SIMS) is introduced, in which diverse methods and innovative technologies can be applied and integrated. This paper gives an introduction of SIMS, defines its design objectives, and summarizes major relevant tools, techniques and paradigms for the development of SIMS, to generate a facilitative environment for small and medium-scale manufacturing enterprises to embrace new and innovative technologies

Past, present and future of information and knowledge sharing in the construction industry: Towards semantic service-based e-construction

The paper reviews product data technology initiatives in the construction sector and provides a synthesis of related ICT industry needs. A comparison between (a) the data centric characteristics of Product Data Technology (PDT) and (b) ontology with a focus on semantics, is given, highlighting the pros and cons of each approach. The paper advocates the migration from data-centric application integration to ontology-based business process support, and proposes inter-enterprise collaboration architectures and frameworks based on semantic services, underpinned by ontology-based knowledge structures. The paper discusses the main reasons behind the low industry take up of product data technology, and proposes a preliminary roadmap for the wide industry diffusion of the proposed approach. In this respect, the paper stresses the value of adopting alliance-based modes of operation

A Brief History of Software Development and Manufacturing

In this article we discover the roots and maturation of software development methods and practices through a comparative study. We notice that the evolution of software development methods has mirrored the evolution in manufacturing paradigms. Further, investigations reveal that the change software development methods have lagged the change in manufacturing paradigms indicating the source of inspiration for software development and practices is manufacturing and not the other way around. This investigation is useful and timely, especially in the context of plan-driven versus agile methods conundrum. It helps us acquire an in-depth understanding of how software development methods originated, why some of them have prevailed while others have not. Further, these insights help us assess the relevance of current practices and methods of software development and predict their future trajectory

Toyota production system - one example to shipbuilding industry

The shipbuilding system can use the techniques used in the Toyota Production System as an example for its production process. Production should be lean, minimize defects, stop production and reduce or eliminate inventories. Lean production is regarded by many as simply an enhancement of mass production methods, whereas agility implies breaking out of the mass production mould and producing much more highly customized products - where the customer wants them in any quantity. In a product line context, it amounts to striving for economies of scope, rather than economies of scale ideally serving ever smaller niche markets, even quantities of one, without the high cost traditionally associated with customization. A lean company may be thought of as a very productive and cost efficient producer of goods or services

An extensible manufacturing resource model for process integration

Driven by industrial needs and enabled by process technology and information technology, enterprise integration is rapidly shifting from information integration to process integration to improve overall performance of enterprises. Traditional resource models are established based on the needs of individual applications. They cannot effectively serve process integration which needs resources to be represented in a unified, comprehensive and flexible way to meet the needs of various applications for different business processes. This paper looks into this issue and presents a configurable and extensible resource model which can be rapidly reconfigured and extended to serve for different applications. To achieve generality, the presented resource model is established from macro level and micro level. A semantic representation method is developed to improve the flexibility and extensibility of the model