Towards Flexible and Cognitive Production—Addressing the Production Challenges

Globalization in the field of industry is fostering the need for cognitive production systems. To implement modern concepts that enable tools and systems for such a cognitive production system, several challenges on the shop floor level must first be resolved. This paper discusses the implementation of selected cognitive technologies on a real industrial case-study of a construction machine manufacturer. The partner company works on the concept of mass customization but utilizes manual labour for the high-variety assembly stations or lines. Sensing and guidance devices are used to provide information to the worker and also retrieve and monitor the working, with respecting data privacy policies. Next, a specified process of data contextualization, visual analytics, and causal discovery is used to extract useful information from the retrieved data via sensors. Communications and safety systems are explained further to complete the loop of implementation of cognitive entities on a manual assembly line. This deepened involvement of cognitive technologies are human-centered, rather than automated systems. The explained cognitive technologies enhance human interaction with the processes and ease the production methods. These concepts form a quintessential vision for an effective assembly line. This paper revolutionizes the existing industry 4.0 with an even-intensified human–machine interaction and moving towards cognitivity

First Measurement Campaign by a Multi-Sensor Robot for the Lifecycle Monitoring of Transformers

Transformers are a very important asset in the electrical transmission grid, and they can suffer from destructive events—e.g., rare transformer fires. Unfortunately, destructive events often lead to a lack of data available for investigators during post-event forensics and failure analysis. This fact has motivated our design and implementation of a robotic multi-sensor platform and cloud backend solution for the lifecycle monitoring, inspection, diagnostics, and condition assessment of transformers. The robotic platform collects data from specific viewpoints around the transformer during operation and at specific relevant lifecycle milestones of the transformer (e.g., at the factory acceptance test) in an automated, repetitive, precise, and reliable manner. The acquired data are stored in the cloud backend, which also provides computing resources and data access to relevant in- and off-premises services (e.g., respectively, SCADA systems, and weather reports). In this paper, we present the results of our first measurement campaign to showcase the value of our solution for transformer lifecycle monitoring, for anomaly detection, and as a crucial tool for post-event forensics in the case of destructive events