Novel applications in assessing manufacturing and assembly of complex composite structures - A pace towards Industry 4.0 in composite manufacturing

Abstract

Cost reduction in manufacturing and assembly processes is playing a decisive role in shaping the future of the rapidly growing composite industry. This key role necessitates adopting more efficient novel technologies in manufacturing and assembly processes. In order to identify the bottlenecks and enhance the proper novel technologies, conventional manufacturing and assembly processes should be accurately assessed. Furthermore, it is essential to rate these novel technologies based on the gained benefits of adopting them within a systematic process assessment. However, the determination of the bottlenecks within the processes as well as the definition of the suitable technologies can be only realized through a parametric process modeling. Practically cost represents a decisive performance parameter in process assessment beside other parameters such as time and environmental impacts, whereas technical cost modeling is considered as a highly precise parametric process modeling. Nonetheless, data collection represents an obstacle in the way of implementing technical cost modeling in composite industry, due to the data availability as well as data complexity. Especially in the case of low automation degree, which is the configuration of the majority of applied composite manufacturing and assembly processes in aeronautical industry nowadays, there is a demand for a proper data collection concept that fulfills a sufficient parametric process modeling. This paper illustrates a novel concept that facilitates the implementation of technical cost modeling as a parametric process modeling for the manufacturing and assembly processes of complex composite structures. This concept consist of several novel data collection applications, whereas this concept doesn’t only enhance the process assessment through a parametric technical cost modeling, but also represent a cornerstone in addressing the Industry 4.0 requirements for both manufacturing and assembly processes of complex composite structures.