An OOT-supported migration approach to holonic robot assembly cell

To date, holonic manufacturing system (HMS), one of the novel concepts to meet the increasing globalization and customization of the manufacturing processes, has been conceptually constructed, and prototyping systems, holonic fixturing station (HOLOFIX), holonic autonomous guided vehicles (H-AGVs) etc. were developed with enhanced performances in their specific processes. This work presented an object oriented technology (OOT)-supported migration approach to holonic robot assembly cell. Based on the analysis of activities in the flexible assembly cell, an architecture of workstation for holonic robot assembly cell was proposed. The holonic robot workstation was established by incorporating a control computer that performs production planning, shop floor control and local operations into each of robot systems in the flexible assembly cell, workstations of this kind functions as the building blocks of holonic robot assembly cell. The holonic robot assembly cell employs a dynamic holarchy evolution mechanism to carry out assembly tasks. The entire implementation was conducted on the flexible assembly system in PMA/Leuven.