Condition templates: improved distributed models for automated fault monitoring of manufacturing systems

This paper considers the problem of monitoring automated manufacturing systems with discrete input and output signals. In such systems, the timing and sequencing of signal changes (events) can be an indication of whether the process is operating correctly. We introduce condition templates as a model to represent the expected timing and sequencing relationships of these events. Condition templates can be distributed over multiple processors in the manufacturing system, allowing a distributed and robust method of fault monitoring. We present the condition templates monitoring method and develop a technique for deriving condition template models from timed automata models