Communication and Control of an Assembly, Disassembly and Repair Flexible Manufacturing Technology on a Mechatronics Line Assisted by an Autonomous Robotic System

Abstract

This paper aims to describe modeling and control in what concerns advanced manufacturing technology running on a flexible assembly, disassembly and repair on a mechatronic line (A/D/RML) assisted by an Autonomous Robotic System (ARS), two robotic manipulators (RM) and visual servoing system (VSS). The A/D/RML consists of a six workstations (WS) mechatronics line (ML) connected to a flexible cell (FC) equipped with a 6-DOF ABB industrial robotic manipulator (IRM) and an ARS used for manipulation and transport. A hybrid communication and control based on programmable logic controller (PLC) architecture is used, which consists of two interconnected systems that feature both distributed and centralized topology, with specific tasks for all the manufacturing stages. Profinet communication link is used to interconnect and control FC and A/D/RML. The paper also discusses how to synchronize data between different field equipment used in the industry and the control systems. Synchronization signals between the master PLC and ARS is performed by means of Modbus TCP protocol and OPC UA. The structure of the ARS consists of a wheeled mobile robot (WMR) with two driving wheels and one free wheel (2DW/1FW) equipped with a 7-DOF RM. Trajectory tracking sliding-mode control (TTSMC) is used to control WMR. The end effector of the ARS RM is equipped with a mobile eye-in-hand VSS technology for the precise positioning of RM to pick and place the workparts in the desired location. Technology operates synchronously with signals from sensors and from the VSS HD camera. If the workpiece does not pass the quality test, the process handles it by transporting back from the end storage unit to the flexible cell where it will be considered for reprocessing, repair or disassembling with the recovery of the dismantled parts. The recovered or replaced components are taken over by the ARS from disassembling location and transported back to the dedicated storage warehouses to be reused in the further assembly processes.