Date of Award
2006
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Engineering Science
Program
Mechanical and Materials Engineering
Supervisor
Dr. Lihui Wang
Second Advisor
Dr. Hsi-Yung (Steve) Feng
Abstract
Small volume and high product variety characterize the shop floor manufacturing. Also, today’s small-to-medium sized companies are challenged by various manufacturing uncertainties, including job delay, urgent job insertion, fixture shortage, missing tool, and even machine break-down. Targeting the dynamic issues, a novel DPP (distributed process planning) approach is proposed to generate machine-neutral process plans and machine-specific operation plans that are adaptive and tolerant to the changes. Moreover, the published international standard IEC 61499 function block, as an enabling technology, is employed to facilitate the realization of the functionalities of DPP. Previous efforts in DPP mainly concentrated on the generic sequence generation and function block design for initial cutting time estimation at the supervisory level. However, this research focuses on realizing the operation planning at the machine tool level by means of function block technology. Aiming at this objective, Communication Function Block and Management Function Block are created. Machining Feature Function Block is redesigned and new algorithms such as tool path generation algorithm are embedded into the Function Block in this research. By adopting new function blocks, operation plans can be created at machine tool level and function block execution can be monitored at shop floor level. Furthermore, a prototype that can demonstrate the operation planning and monitoring is developed to prove the concept of function block enabled distributed process planning.
Recommended Citation
Song, Changjin, "Function Block Enabled Operation Planning and Monitoring in Distributed Process Planning" (2006). Digitized Theses. 5132.
https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/digitizedtheses/5132