11,703 research outputs found
Order fulfillment in high variety production environments
Providing high levels of product variety and product customization is challenging for many companies. This paper presents a new classification of production and order fulfillment approaches available to manufacturing companies that offer high variety and/or product customization. Six categories of approaches are identified and described. An important emerging approach - open pipeline planning – is highlighted for high variety manufacturing environments. It allows a customer order to be fulfilled from anywhere in the system, enabling greater responsiveness in Build-to-Forecast systems. The links between the open pipeline approach, decoupling concepts and postponement strategies are discussed and the relevance of the approach to the volume automotive sector is highlighted. Results from a simulation study are presented illustrating the potential benefits when products can be reconfigured in an open pipeline system. The application of open pipeline concepts to different manufacturing domains is discussed and the operating characteristics of most relevance are highlighted. In addition to the automotive, sectors such as machinery and instrumentation, computer servers, telecommunications and electronic equipment may benefit from an open pipeline planning approach. When properly designed these systems can significantly enhance order fulfillment performance
Innovative configurable and collaborative approach to automation systems engineering for automotive powertrain assembly
Presently the automotive industry is facing enormous pressure due to global
competition and ever changing legislative, economic and customer demands. Both,
agility and reconfiguration are widely recognised as important attributes for
manufacturing systems to satisfy the needs of competitive global markets. To facilitate
and accommodate unforeseen business changes within the automotive industry, a new
proactive methodology is urgently required for the design, build, assembly and
reconfiguration of automation systems. There is also need for the promotion of new
technologies and engineering methods to enable true engineering concurrency between
product and process development. Virtual construction and testing of new automation
systems prior to build is now identified as a crucial requirement to enable system
verification and to allow the investigation of design alternatives prior to building and
testing physical systems. The main focus of this research was to design and develop
reconfigurable assembly systems within the powertrain sector of the automotive
industry by capturing and modelling relevant business and engineering processes.
This research has proposed and developed a more process-efficient and robust
automation system design, build and implementation approach via new engineering
services and a standard library of reusable mechanisms. Existing research at
Loughborough had created the basic technology for a component based approach to
automation. However, no research had been previously undertaken on the application of
this approach in a user engineering and business context. The objective of this research
was therefore to utilise this prototype method and associated engineering tools and to
devise novel business and engineering processes to enable the component-based
approach to be applied in industry. This new approach has been named Configurable
and Collaborative Automation Systems (CO AS). In particular this new research has
studied the implications of migration to a COAS approach in terms of I) necessary
changes to the end-users business processes, 2) potential to improve the robustness of
the resultant system and 3) potential for improved efficiency and greater collaboration
across the supply chain... cont'
Sustainability in the Aerospace, Naval, and Automotive Supply Chain 4.0: Descriptive Review
The search for sustainability in the Supply Chain (SC) is one of the tasks that most concerns business leaders in all manufacturing sectors because of the importance that the Supply Chain has as a transversal tool and due to the leading role that it has been playing lately. Of all the manufacturing sectors, this study focuses on the aerospace, shipbuilding, and automotive sectors identified as transport. The present study carries out a descriptive review of existing publications in these three sectors in relation to the sustainability of the Supply Chain in its 4.0 adaptation as an update in matters that are in constant evolution. Among the results obtained, Lean practices are common to the three sectors, as well as different technologies focused on sustainability. Furthermore, the results show that the automotive sector is the one that makes the greatest contribution in this sense through collaborative programs that can be very useful to the other two sectors, thus benefiting from the consequent applicable advantages. Meanwhile, the Aerospace and Shipbuilding sectors do not seem to be working on promoting a sustainable culture in the management of the Supply Chain or on including training programs for their personnel in matters related to Industry 4.0
A literature review and Research Agenda of Value Stream Mapping addressing Study Population and Sample Design
The Purpose of this literature review is to provide a taxonomy of value stream mapping research and, based on that, to develop a research agenda for this field of study in relation to study population and research design. The proposed value stream mapping research classification framework is based on a comprehensive literature review, which concentrates on peer-reviewed journal papers published within the period 2002-2020. A total of 83 academic sources have been retrieved and analyzed interms of research purpose and nature, methodology employed, theoretical approach and level of analysis. The review reveals that value stream mapping research is empirical-descriptive in nature and that it generally lacks a sampling design foundation and a tin study population. It identifies certain knowledge gaps and develops sixe propositions for future research. It suggests that focus should be directed towards more conceptual model, mathematical model, interviews, empirical triangulation (mixed methods) and simulation based studies. It also argues that further empirical research in relation to value stream mapping in relation to study population and sample design needed. This paper fulfils an identified need for a comprehensive classification framework of value stream mapping studies. It essentially provides both academics and practitioners with a conceptual map of existing value stream mapping research and also points out opportunities for future research
Set-Based Concurrent Engineering Model for Automotive Electronic/Software Systems Development
Organised by: Cranfield UniversityThis paper is presenting a proposal of a novel approach to automotive electronic/software systems
development. It is based on the combination of Set-Based Concurrent Engineering, a Toyota approach to
product development, with the standard V-Model of software development. Automotive industry currently
faces the problem of growing complexity of electronic/software systems. This issue is especially visible at
the level of integration of these systems which is difficult and error-prone. The presented conceptual
proposal is to establish better processes that could handle the electronic/software systems design and
development in a more integrated and consistent manner.Mori Seiki – The Machine Tool Compan
Development of a toolkit for component-based automation systems
From the earliest days of mass production in the automotive industry there has been a
progressive move towards the use of flexible manufacturing systems that cater for
product variants that meet market demands. In recent years this market has become
more demanding with pressures from legislation, globalisation and increased
customer expectations. This has lead to the current trends of mass customisation in
production.
In order to support this manufacturing systems are not only becoming more flexibleâ€
to cope with the increased product variants, but also more agile‡ such that they may
respond more rapidly to market changes. Modularisation§ is widely used to increase
the agility of automation systems, such that they may be more readily reconfigured¶.
Also with globalisation into India and Asia semi-automatic machines (machines that
interact with human operators) are more frequently used to reduce capital outlay and
increase flexibility. There is an increasing need for tools and methodologies that
support this in order to improve design robustness, reduce design time and gain a
competitive edge in the market.
The research presented in this thesis is built upon the work from
COMPAG/COMPANION (COMponent- based Paradigm for AGile automation, and
COmmon Model for PArtNers in automatION), and as part of the BDA (Business
Driven Automation), SOCRADES (Service Oriented Cross-layer infrastructure for
Distributed smart Embedded deviceS), and IMC-AESOP (ArchitecturE for Service-
Oriented Process – monitoring and control) projects conducted at Loughborough
University UK.
This research details the design and implementation of a toolkit for building and
simulating automation systems comprising components with behaviour described
using Finite State Machines (FSM). The research focus is the development of the
engineering toolkit that can support the automation system lifecycle from initial
design through commissioning to maintenance and reconfiguration as well as the
integration of a virtual human. This is achieved using a novel data structure that
supports component definitions for control, simulation, maintenance and the novel
integration of a virtual human into the automation system operation
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