From plant and logistics control to multi-enterprise collaboration

collaboratio

One-step fast calibration of an industrial workcell

The calibration of a work cell is a process which allows to increase the accuracy of an industrial robot in reaching Cartesian locations. This is a crucial aspect if the robotic manipulator is required to perform accurate positioning to non-recorded locations or has to interact with external equipment. The calibration of a work cell is a time-consuming task and has to be repeated several times during set-up and every time the robot, equipment or sensors are moved from their original position for some reason, like maintenance. In this paper, a multi-calibration device and procedure are presented, which allow calibrating a picking plane with a one-step fast data acquisition procedure

Workplace Optimization Using a Collaborative Robot

The study describes increasing the productivity of the production process using robotization. The application of robots in the manufacturing process and logistics requires a very thorough analysis and knowledge of manufacturing processes. The theoretical part describes the knowledge gained from the scientific literature concerning the robotization and technical standards of the Czech Republic. In the practical part there is an analysis of the current situation – i.e. defining a selected production line and selected workplaces on these lines, especially in terms of activities. The activities performed at these sites and their duration are crucial for determining the suitability of the site for implementing the robot. In the next chapter, the workplaces are evaluated in terms of activities that can be transferred from the operator to the robot to determine which percentage replacement of the operator is feasible. Thus, the selection of suitable activities (processes) for automation will be made at the workplace. The technical solution of the implementation is also proposed for the selected workplace. To achieve a successful application of the collaborative robot into the production process, it was necessary to change the location of the workplace, including electrical and air distribution, investment in a new conveyor and laser gauges. The new layout was based on saving space and saving human influence in the production process. The whole study shows a systematic approach to the introduction of the above-described issue. © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020

A review on assembly sequence planning and assembly line balancing optimisation using soft computing approaches

Assembly optimisation activities occur across development and production stages of manufacturing goods. Assembly Sequence Planning (ASP) and Assembly Line Balancing (ALB) problems are among the assembly optimisation. Both of these activities are classified as NP-hard. Several soft computing approaches using different techniques have been developed to solve ASP and ALB. Although these approaches do not guarantee the optimum solution, they have been successfully applied in many ASP and ALB optimisation works. This paper reported the survey on research in ASP and ALB that use soft computing approaches for the past 10years. To be more specific, only Simple Assembly Line Balancing Problem (SALBP) is considered for ALB. The survey shows that three soft computing algorithms that frequently used to solve ASP and ALB are Genetic Algorithm, Ant Colony Optimisation and Particle Swarm Optimisation. Meanwhile, the research in ASP and ALB is also progressing to the next level by integration of assembly optimisation activities across product development stages