Smart Adaptable Assembly Systems

In today's manufacturing environment, change has become a constant. Modern assembly systems must adapt to products, markets, technologies and regulatory requirements. The assembly industry is undergoing vast changes with the rapid development of production automation, process control, information technologies and networking. Variant-oriented assembly systems have been developed to achieve more flexibility and adaptability to enable adding product variants and scaling production. Smart assembly systems where intelligence is embedded in the products, work stations and system are emerging to achieve more autonomy in communication between entities in the system and more adaptable control of assembly flow and system performance. This paper highlights some advances in assembly technologies and systems and new trends of modularity and reconfigurable using a modular and reconfigurable assembly system. Future directions and challenges are outlined.