The Assist-by-X system : calibration and application of a modular production equipment for visual assistance

Abstract

Shorter production lifecycles, new challenges due to the advancing globalization, and increasing demand for individualized products are only some of the general conditions that internationally operating manufacturing companies have to face. Therefore, adaptable production systems are required which can be changed to the current requirements of the production process. In this article, a modular visual assistance system is presented which can be integrated in different production systems and environments. For a successful integration of the assistance system a calibration is indispensable, thus a calibration method for one component of the assistance system is discussed in detail. In order to control the system, a visual data flow programming tool is used in combination with MQTT as a standard communication protocol. By doing so, the programming effort of the system is reduced and new components can easily be added to the system by creating new flows.