Smart sensors for autonomous robotic panel assembly

Manufacturing of a typical aluminium airframe panel involves the assembly of a couple of stringers and several dozens of clips. The stringers have to be mounted to the skin by riveting, while the clips are glued by using a fast hardening sealant. Though there are stringers and clips of identical geometry, there is too much part variation to make automation an easy task, and since tolerances are introduced by sagging manual work is still state of the art in order to cope with this. The paper is about the implementation of a computer vision sensor system that is capable of identifying individual clips by their CAD-drill hole pattern, determine the clips position and allow a robot to correctly pick and place them regardless of positional tolerances. In addition to that, a high accuracy drill hole detector that enables to correctly pick and place stringers and compensates the sagging effects, has been implemented. To ensure the quality of the detection processes the position of the individual parts have been investigated by a structured-light 3D-Camera. Within the paper the involved measurement technologies and the robot calibration are focused. An overview of the entire process chain is also given as well as an outlook to future applications in related areas

Autonomous Composite Production by Robotic Pick & Place

During the last decade the DLR Center of Lightweigth Production Technology (ZLP) in Augsburg investigated the potential of the autonomous production of composite parts by means of pick and place executed by industrial robots. Starting from conventional teaching the research focus was extended to the development of technology bricks for computer vision based gripping, automated derivation of grip- and drop coordinates from CAD data, digital process description and workflow, autonomous cut-piece transfer by means of collision free path planning and a multi-robot synchronization and execution layer. The technology bricks are enriched by a process data acquisition system and controlled by a manufacturing execution system embedded into a high-level process control system. In this work we give an overview of the developed technologies and achievements based upon several use cases from the field of composite production

Dove or Hawk? Characterizing monetary policy regime switches in India

The past two decades have witnessed a worldwide move by emerging markets to adopt explicit or implicit inflation targeting regimes. A notable and often discussed exception to this trend, of course, is China which follows a pegged exchange rate regime supported by capital controls. Another major exception is India. It is not clear how to characterize the monetary regime or identify the nominal monetary anchor in India. Is central bank policy in India following a predictable rule that is heavily influenced by a quasi inflation target? And how has the monetary regime been affected by the gradual process of financial liberalization in India? To address these points, we investigate monetary policy regime change in India using a Markov switching model to estimate a time-varying Taylor-type rule for the Reserve Bank of India. We find that the conduct of monetary policy over the last two decades can be characterized by two regimes, which we term 'Hawk' and 'Dove.' In the first of these two regimes, the central bank reveals a greater relative (though not absolute) weight on controlling inflation vis-à-vis narrowing the output gap. The central bank however was found to be in the "Dove" regime about half of our sample period, focusing more on the output gap and exchange rate targets to stimulate exports, rather than moderating inflation. India thus seems to be following its own direction in the conduct of monetary policy, seemingly not overly influenced by the emphasis on quasi-inflation targeting seen in many emerging markets. © 2013 Elsevier B.V

Increasing exchange rate volatility during the recent float

The paper examines empirically whether the volatility of major floating exchange rates shows any systematic change during the period from 1973 to 1998. Four measures for unconditional and conditional volatility demonstrate increasing volatility for most currencies and for two worldwide baskets of exchange rates. Structural breaks are identified for several exchange rates, implying that the volatility increase is in some cases due to upward shifts and not due to continuous changes. This may indicate that in addition to permanent microstructural impacts, macroeconomically-caused shifts are possibly also important for the volatility increase.