Many employees spend most of their time communicating and interacting with other employees in an attempt to find out the status of machine, processes,
materials, and orders that must be filled. What is needed is an information processing system that ties all of these needs together in an on-line, integrated system – CIM.
There are lots of definitions for conceptual of CIM, but it does not vary in between of them. One of the concept defining CIM as to be the integration of all the
processes necessary to manufacture a product through the use of computer technology, tool or method used to improve entirely design, manufacturing process
and increase productivity [Kalpakjian, 1995]. The other point of view define CIM as integration of total manufacturing enterprise through the use of integrated systems
and data communications coupled with new managerial philosophies that improve organizational and personnel efficiency [Singh and Nanua, 1996]
CIM, as the name implies, the computer is the pivotal element in such system. Through the use of various computer-aided technologies, CIM attempts to pull all of
the functional areas of a business into a cohesive, interconnected, interactive and self-aware whole.
1.1 Background Study
Assembly work has a very long history. Ancient people already knew how to create a useful object composed of multiple parts. However, the objective of modern
assembly process is to produce high quality and low cost products. Automation assembly planning of a product is a complex problem which involves different
artificial intelligence and consideration issues like assembly sequence, execution, flexibility, precise mechanisms, and control, etc. A product is a result of
subassemblies being composed into a complete assembly. In order to generate all possible assembly sequences, the determination of an assembly sequence is based on
all possible connectivity and relations between parts in a product. These sequences
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will be evaluated using the feasibility criteria and optimization criteria to determine the best assembly sequence possible. [Mardanov et al., 1999]
Now, the complete set of valid assembly sequences is explored first. The freedom of separations is defined to determine the possible direction of assembly
which must satisfied the feasibility criteria. These criteria are determined by limitations of devices and environment. They are:
a Mechanical feasibility, which contain information about the ability for
manipulation: i
The manipulation directions, ii
Size and weight properties, iii
Hardness of the assembly parts.
b Connection characteristics, which contains the fit type information
In order to assembly two parts, the part being manipulated must be ready to be manipulated. When considering a product assembly, the scale and accuracy of the
task must be defined.
1.2 Problem Statements
Manufacturing Industries are facing stiff competition in every field. Product customerisation is increasing the complexity and variety of products with smaller
batch size. Besides, product modification takes place very frequently causing changes in some components. In such situation it becomes important for a centralized
point of information to know the material and processes in the plant [Mohsen, 1997]. A conventional manufacturing plant is a widely distributed layout of material and
process; it is not uncommon for material and work-in-process to become lost as it is transferred from dept to dept and from person to person. Flexible manufacturing
plant consist lot of different assembly stations, dealing with different of the material
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handling processes material feeder, parts assembly, mechanical vision inspections and etc.
The goals of this CIM workstation are to give students experiences with the following real-world technologies, they are: computer-aided designcomputer-aided
manufacturing CADCAM, robotics, concurrent design, computer-aided quality control, and CIM integration.
1.3 Objectives
