Design Of Production Systems Research Articles

Setting production capacities for production agents making selfish routing decisions

ABSTRACTTraditionally, the capacity dimensioning step within the manufacturing system design process takes a known and fixed distribution of production flow across path alternatives to derive capacity demand based on a desired target utilisation rate. Setting target rates for machine utilisation provides limits on throughput times and allows to provide capacity buffers against changes in the production mix. In this contribution, we transfer this rationale into the world of Industry 4.0, where Cyber-Physical Systems can make autonomous and selfish routing decisions. Under this new framework, non-cooperative agents make decisions based on the capacity allocation and the decisions of all other agents, thus creating a feedback between flow and capacity distribution that makes existing methods for capacity dimensioning inapplicable. We use methods and insight from algorithmic game theory and operations research to investigate the capacity dimensioning process in this context. We prove properties of the throughput-time optimal allocation of production capacity under fixed target utilisation rates for important queue classes. Our findings not only provide a quantitative, easy to operationalise tool for production system designers, but also explore a trade-off between cost and flexibility that arises naturally in this regime.

ORIENTATION SYSTEM OF PV PANELS AFTER SUN

The purpose of the project is create a PV panels orientation system after the sun, with return to home position when dark is coming. The system must be energetically autonomous, and also have the ability to constantly provide power. The orientation of photovoltaic panels is an important factor that we must take into account in the design of energy production systems based on solar radiation. Solar guidance systems increase the efficiency of the power generation system by keeping the panels in a position perpendicular to the light rays. The two-axis orientation method was used. The wiring diagram has been designed so that the guidance system works in both manual and automatic modes. For the system to be energy-independent and, linked to the power supply of the drive motors for the two axis, we used a MPPT charger for the battery used as a energy source. Finding the best solutions for increasing system efficiency and energy independence will be presented in this paper.

An integrated framework for design, management and operation of reconfigurable assembly systems

Manufacturing has to cope with the continuously increasing variety of products, change of volumes and shortening product life cycles. These trends also affect the automotive sector: the frequent introduction of new models, materials and assembly technologies put the suppliers of make-to-order parts under pressure. In this context, the design of assembly systems and their management are of paramount importance for the companies’ competitiveness. In this paper, we propose an approach for the design and reconfiguration of modular assembly systems through the integration of different computational tools addressing the design of the system, the optimization of the layout, the planning of reconfiguration actions as well as production planning. Integrating these computational tools and iterating through the resulting workflow and feedback allow to consider the outcomes and dependencies of alternative decision sequences holistically with the objective of an effective and efficient approach to production system design and management. The viability of the approach is demonstrated through the application to an automotive case study.

Design Change Model for Effective Scheduling Change Propagation Paths

Changes in requirements may result in the increasing of product development project cost and lead time, therefore, it is important to understand how requirement changes propagate in the design of complex product systems and be able to select best options to guide design. Currently, a most approach for design change is lack of take the multi-disciplinary coupling relationships and the number of parameters into account integrally. A new design change model is presented to systematically analyze and search change propagation paths. Firstly, a PDS-Behavior-Structure-based design change model is established to describe requirement changes causing the design change propagation in behavior and structure domains. Secondly, a multi-disciplinary oriented behavior matrix is utilized to support change propagation analysis of complex product systems, and the interaction relationships of the matrix elements are used to obtain an initial set of change paths. Finally, a rough set-based propagation space reducing tool is developed to assist in narrowing change propagation paths by computing the importance of the design change parameters. The proposed new design change model and its associated tools have been demonstrated by the scheduling change propagation paths of high speed train’s bogie to show its feasibility and effectiveness. This model is not only supportive to response quickly to diversified market requirements, but also helpful to satisfy customer requirements and reduce product development lead time. The proposed new design change model can be applied in a wide range of engineering systems design with improved efficiency.

Detailed visualization of communication network topologies

Analysis of computer networks is essential for the design and maintenance of complex production systems, especially considering the increasing interconnection by Internet of Things devices. An important tool in network analysis is the visualization of network topologies. In this work we present a novel approach for automatic visualization of rooted trees that includes port specifc connections as they appear in communication networks. We further show how this algorithm improves the drawing of industrial Ethernet network topologies, taking also problematic properties such as cycles and multiple root nodes into account.

A Knowledge Extraction and Design Support System for Supporting Industrial and Product Design

Industrial and product design involves a lot of unstructured information for the generation of innovative product design ideas. However, the generation of innovative design concepts is not only time consuming but also heavily relies on the experience of product designers. Most existing systems focus mainly on the technical aspects of realizing product designs, which are inadequate to support concept generation process at the pre-design stage. In this paper, a knowledge extraction and design support system (KEDSS) is presented. The system aims at extracting key design concepts and depicting the trends of these concepts from the massive amount of unstructured design information in the open domain. A summary report, a related concept list, and concept trend graphs are produced based on the inputs of the designers' design ideas. A series of experiments have been conducted to measure the performance of the system. Moreover, the system has been successfully trial implemented as part of a public service platform for modern industrial design of injection molding machinery and equipment.

A semantic reconciliation view to support the interoperable information relationships in product design and manufacturing

Global competitiveness has challenged manufacturing industry to rationalize different ways of bringing to the market new products in a short lead-time with competitive prices, high quality, and customization. Modern Product Development Process (PDP) has been requiring simultaneously collaboration of multiple groups, exchanging information from multiple perspectives within and across enterprise boundaries. However, semantic interoperability issues (misinterpretation and mistakes) in view of the information heterogeneity from multiple perspectives and their relationships. This research proposes a semantic reconciliation view to support the interoperable information relationships in product design and manufacturing. This view is part of the conceptual framework of an Interoperable Product Design and Manufacturing System (IPDMS). The semantic reconciliation method uses three approaches (Adjustment Context, Ontology Intersection, and Semantic Alignment) to provide support for the semantic information relationships across the product design and manufacturing. The method is applied in a rotational thin-wall plastic injected design and manufacturing and evaluated through the development of semantic rules responsible for the information mapping of sharing, conversion and translation. This semantic rules were modeled in Semantic Web Rule Language (SWRL) supported by Web Ontology Languages (OWL). Sequentially, the potential benefits and limitation of the method was discussed, contributing to the semantic information interoperability during the development of complex products.

AEN-PRO: Agent-based simulation tool for performance and working conditions assessment in production systems using workers’ margins of manoeuver

During the last eighty years, new work philosophies has been introduced and technological advancement changed radically the way of work, making it more reactive, agile but complex as well. As a result, classical approaches for production system design may no longer be sufficient to ensure productivity and safety of industrial systems. In the domain of occupational diseases, adopting a pure biomechanical approach, consisting in ensuring the non-violation of workers’ biomechanical limits at each workstation is proved to be uncomplete. Beside biomechanical risk factors, psychosocial risk factors, which are strongly linked to the dynamic of the physical and informational flows, may contribute to the genesis of Musculoskeletal Disorders. By granting a certain workers’ margins of manoeuver, these risk factors can be limited. This article introduces AEN-PRO, a simulation tool for investigating the impact of physical flow on the production system and particularly workers, to assess their margins of manoeuver and to ensure safer and productive systems.

APPLICATION OF THE AUGMENTED REALITY IN PRODUCTION PRACTICE

Current requirements which are connected with designing new, or reali-zing the existing production systems, cause continuous and rapid changes in products and processes. This means that classical approaches of pro-duction systems design have to be extended by advanced technologies and methods, such as digital factory, virtual and augmented reality, computer simulation, reverse engineering, etc. The article describes new computer technologies, which were applied in production practice, with a particular focus on the augmented reality technology.

Optimal design of hybrid wind/photovoltaic electrolyzer for maximum hydrogen production using imperialist competitive algorithm

The rising demand for high-density power storage systems such as hydrogen, combined with renewable power production systems, has led to the design of optimal power production and storage systems. In this study, a wind and photovoltaic (PV) hybrid electrolyzer system, which maximizes the hydrogen production for a diurnal operation of the system, is designed and simulated. The operation of the system is optimized using imperialist competitive algorithm (ICA). The objective of this optimization is to combine the PV array and wind turbine (WT) in a way that, for minimized average excess power generation, maximum hydrogen would be produced. Actual meteorological data of Miami is used for simulations. A framework of the advanced alkaline electrolyzer with the detailed electrochemical model is used. This optimal system comprises a PV module with a power of 7.9 kW and a WT module with a power of 11 kW. The rate of hydrogen production is 0.0192 mol/s; an average Faraday efficiency of 86.9 percent. The electrolyzer works with 53.7 percent of its nominal power. The availability of the wind for longer periods of time reflects the greater contribution of WT in comparison with PV towards the overall throughput of the system.

Research and Practice on the Teaching of Fashion and Technology Product System Design

With the advantages of the integration of the arts and technology of BIFT, this paper discussed the method of application-oriented talents in Arts and Engineering. With the teaching reform of the product design course as the breakthrough point, the teaching idea of integrating the science and technology with the fashion element was embodied in the curriculum teaching practice, and the systematic teaching model of the fashionable technology product was constructed. Through the training of engineering students' artistic accomplishment and scientific and technological innovation ability, and supplemented by discipline competition-oriented, the formation of professional teaching, discipline competition to promote the benign mode was established. The preliminary exploration of art and science interdisciplinary personnel training was discussed in the paper.

Multi-variation propagation prediction based on multi-agent system for complex mechanical product design

The design change propagation in a complex product is characteristic of nonlinear, dynamic, and uncertain; its impact analysis becomes challenging. Furthermore, the multiple changes occurring concu...

A Web-Based Tool for Energy Balance Estimation in Multiple-Crops Production Systems

Biomass production systems include multiple-crops rotations, various machinery systems, diversified operational practices and several dispersed fields located in a range of distances between the various facilities (e.g., storage and processing facilities). These factors diversify the energy and cost requirements of the system. To that effect, assessment tools dedicated a single-crop production based on average standards cannot provide an insight evaluation of a specific production system, e.g., for a whole farm in terms of energy and cost requirements. This paper is the continuation of previous work, which presents a web-based tool for cost estimation of biomass production and transportation of multiple-crop production. In the present work, the tool is extended to additionally provide the energy balance of the examined systems. The energy input includes the whole supply chain of the biomass, namely crop cultivation, harvesting, handling of biomass and transportation to the processing facilities. A case study involving a real crop production system that feeds a biogas plant of 200 kW was selected for the demonstration of the tool’s applicability. The output of the tool provides a series of indexes dedicated to the energy input and balance. The presented tool can be used for the comparison of the performance, in terms of energy requirements, between various crops, fields, operations practices, and operations systems providing support for decisions on the biomass production system design (e.g., allocation of crops to fields) and operations management (e.g., machinery system selection).

The Cultural Innovative Product Design Based on the Regional Culture

The expression of the cultural characteristics is an important means to improve the added value of the products. And the cultural innovative product design based on the regional culture is the effective way for developing the innovative industry of the regional culture and enhancing the design level of the innovative products. From the analysis of the hierarch and connotation of the product system design this article studied the method how to incorporate the regional cultural features into the product system design and put forward the two methods of longitudinal and transverse design and verified the methods by the specific example of the product design.

Virtual Prototyping and Validation of Cpps within a New Software Framework

As a result of the growing demand for highly customized and individual products, companies need to enable flexible and intelligent manufacturing. Cyber-physical production systems (CPPS) will act autonomously in the future in an interlinked production and enable such flexibility. However, German mid-sized plant manufacturers rarely use virtual technologies for design and validation in order to design CPPS. The research project Virtual Commissioning with Smart Hybrid Prototyping (VIB-SHP) investigated the usage of virtual technologies for manufacturing systems and CPPS design. Aspects of asynchronous communicating, intelligent- and autonomous-acting production equipment in an immersive validation environment, have been investigated. To enable manufacturing system designers to validate CPPS, a software framework for virtual prototyping has been developed. A mechatronic construction kit for production system design integrates discipline-specific models and manages them in a product lifecycle management (PLM) solution. With this construction kit manufacturing designers are able to apply virtual technologies and the validation of communication processes with the help of behavior models. The presented approach resolves the sequential design process for the development of mechanical, electrical, and software elements and ensures the consistency of these models. With the help of a bill of material (BOM)- and signal-based alignment of the discipline-specific models in an integrated mechatronic product model, the communication of the design status and changes are improved. The re-use of already-specified and -designed modules enable quick behavior modeling, code evaluation, as well as interaction with the virtualized assembly system in an immersive environment.

Environmental cues that induce the physiology of solid medium: a study on lovastatin production by Aspergillus terreus.

The aim of this work was to identify the main environmental factors that induce the special physiology displayed by fungi growing in solid culture-that is, higher secondary metabolite (SM) production-compared with those in submerged culture. Lovastatin-specific production (SP) was used as an indicator of the physiological status, and different model culture systems were used to evaluate the impact of potential solid-state fermentation (SSF) environmental stimuli. Direct contact with air was identified as an important stimulus. Cultures with two or more hours of exposure to air showed typical SSF lovastatin SP (1462% higher than cultures exposed for 0·08h). Intermediate times of exposure generated intermediate physiological states. Support-related stimuli also induced higher lovastatin SP, even in a liquid environment (679% increase). Direct contact with air, as well as support-related stimuli, are major environmental cues that induce the physiology of solid medium. This knowledge is the starting point to investigate how these environmental cues are sensed and transduced, impacting SM and enzyme production. These results have important applied potential in new strategies to generate overproducing strains, as well as application in the design of novel production systems.

A Case Study in Incorporating Significant Design Content into a Third-Year Industrial Engineering Course “Design and Analysis of Production Systems”

In recent years the CEAB has ben communicating to Engineering Faculties in Canada that “Engineering Design” is a key attribute that graduates should have when they finish their undergraduate degree. It hasalso been suggested that producing engineers with significant design skills is important for the Canadian economy as a whole and, in Dalhousie University’s context, Nova Scotia. Unfortunately “Design” is adifficult skill to teach or transfer; a recent article in Maclean’s suggests many engineering graduates around the country are leaving the university with an uneasy feeling that all they have been taught to dois “plug and chug.” How do we respond to this need? This paper offers a case study of how a third-year Industrial Engineering course shifted from a mainly book-and-formula based course to an offering which incorporated significant open-ended design content (25%) intended to both satisfy CEAB requirements and address the need for students to exercise their creative, hands-on problem-solving skills. Student project outcomes as well as anecdotal and SRI data suggest the shift to a design-focussedcourse was a success.

Holistic Material Selection Approach for More Sustainable Products

The relevance of material consumption during the product lifecycle is catching up with that of energy consumption. While the share of renewable energy sources has continuously been rising over the last years, material resources are getting more and more limited on earth. Thus, a method that enables a holistic material selection is essential to develop truly sustainable products. The selection of suitable materials is closely correlating with product and production system design. Hence, an integrated consideration of the three dimensions product, production and material is necessary. In practical engineering, however, these three dimensions are often developed independently and interactions are not sufficiently considered what results in less sustainable products.This paper presents a holistic material selection approach that equally considers material, product and production system aspects and requires a multidimensional assessment of potential solutions for these dimensions according to material consumption as well as technical and economic requirements.

Function recommender system for product planning and design

Functions play a critical role in bridging intangible user needs and physical design parameters. Recommender systems ubiquitously exist in eCommerce to recommend new products to a target user. However, in most cases, the main purpose for users to acquire a product is to gain its functionality rather than owning its physical embodiment. Inspired by existing recommender systems for eCommerce, this paper presents a function recommender system for product planning and design, which represents a revolutionizing paradigm of recommending new functions to a product. A systemic function recommendation process is elaborated, and a case study is presented to showcase practical applications.

The design of production systems at the enterprises of agroindustrial complex

Food and beverage industry is one of the leading sectors of the economy. Stable operation of the sector contributes to the growth of production volumes and investments in the modernization of enterprises, the creation of new industries. Before the management of the enterprises in the manufacturing sector there is a need in addressing improvement of its processes and procedures to fulfill the quality objectives, improve performance, reduce losses, improve product competitiveness, and so on. To date, to ensure consumer confidence in the quality of the resulting product occurs the need for the organization of management systems. Methodology of improvement “Six Sigma” helps to improve the financial efficiency of the organization by preventing the occurrence of errors and uncontrolled deviations from the normal functioning of the processes. This makes it attractive for enterprises of processing industries. The main tool of the method is to analyze the distribution laws of the raw material quality indicators, semi-finished products, technological modes, a comparison of their fields scattering with regulatory requirements. Testing of the methodology “Six Sigma” at one of the Voronezh region can help solve the problems identified, the search for and implementation of activities to achieve the target values of indicators of processes, and accordingly the organization's strategic goals. With the introduction of Six concept have been used a variety of tools, ranging from the collection and statistical methods of data analysis tools to generate ideas and organize information. Proper use of analytical tools is critical to achieve the desired result. Thus, based on an analytical approach to work with processes, “Six Sigma ” leads to a maximum level of customer satisfaction and reduce the cost of production, can achieve almost zero-defect production thanks to the synthesis of powerful data analysis and systematic staff training.