Decision making logic for flexible assembly lines reconfiguration

This paper presents a framework for the control of autonomous production units for real time reconfiguration of the shop floor. The approach considers a series of highly flexible production solutions including a) autonomous mobile manipulators, which are capable of repositioning themselves on the line, b) flexible grippers with multiple connection points that allow the exchange of both parts and grippers between robots. The paper focuses on providing a decision making mechanism for the generation of efficient shop floor reconfiguration plans that can efficiently exploit these functionalities. The developments have been tested in a case study in the automotive industry and most specifically, in the Body in White (BIW) assembly stage. Simulation models have been used for the evaluation of the control logic performance and the results indicate that a significant increase in the overall resource utilization can be achieved.