Simulation of a Flexible Manufacturing System

Abstract

This paper describes simulation software, which can be used to simulate a robot-based flexible manufacturing system. The FMS is simulated by four terminals on a VAX 11/750 computer. The operator can learn how the manufacturing system works, observing the tracks of the tools and of the robot gripper, the sequence of the machining process, the machining time and the machining block number. One termnal is a control terminal running an interactive program. The other terminals are on-line graphic screen displays of toolpaths on the lathe and milling machine and the route of the robot gripper. When running the program from the control terminal, a different picture is displayed simultaneously on each of these graphic screens showing the state of the different elements of the system which are a lathe, a milling machine and a robot. Also showing are the machining block number and the elapsed machining time. The simulation can be used to optimise the design and work scheduling of the FMS system.