Werk 4.0
From conventional production plant to resilient competence plant through Industry 4.0
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
Networked Shopfloor & Mobile Quality Gates
MOTIVATION
The automotive industry is changing. Electrification and digitalisation are fundamentally altering it. Thus, the global production network of Mercedes-Benz with all its vehicle and drive factories is also evolving. Motivated by this, the project deals with a future production system for the German luxury car manufacturer. The project is taking place in harmony with other companies undergoing transformation.
OBJECTIVE AND APPROACH
In the project, a resilient production concept is developed and implemented through the integration of innovative technologies. This will enable faster adaptations to unpredictable changes in market and technology requirements and produce the products of the future in a timely manner. Building on various necessary technical innovations, this initially means restructuring. The new structure builds on the DevOps concept developed in the software industry, that development, planning, implementation and production are no longer organisationally separated, sequential or partially parallelised, but that these functions are jointly designed and responsible from start to finish (E2E). Production becomes more intelligent and acquires the necessary competence to introduce and implement changes itself on the basis of its current status and thus to react better to external influences.
INNOVATION AND PERSPECTIVES
In a real lab, 8 work packages are integrated to implement a resilient competence factory. DevOps concept in production means:
Integration of Digital Twins to implement updates and adjustments in ongoing production.
Establishment of technology-independent data formats and interfaces to enable Digital Twins in the respective context throughout the entire life cycle as a central data source and Single-Source-of-Truth (SSoT)
Establishment of human-machine interfaces for simple intuitive operation of the digital twins and for the necessary qualification of the operating employees.
OUR CONTRIBUTION
Networked Shopfloor (WP1)
The aim is to develop a uniform software basis for distributed communication systems of the shop floor, with which industrial end users of automotive production can master application-driven complexity and adaptability and set up and operate future-proof automation systems. The aim is to achieve an approach that prevents vendor lock-ins and enables high-performance communication through open but secure standards and enables complex automation systems efficiently through automated functions and keeps them changeable and expandable.
Mobile Quality Gates (WP3)
The aim is to develop a mobile, intuitive visual inspection system that can be easily operated by workers and trained within a few minutes and with only a few images. The so-called quality gate, consisting of hardware and networked software, should be usable locally and with cloud/edge support and be able to connect to plants. The focus of the application is inline process control. In addition, an intuitive quality gate (based on AI) that can be quickly adapted and trained for new components and environments should be the result of the sub-project. Test objects are, for example, the monitoring of assembly or the condition of parts and components in production. The focus here is on training new components quickly and without programming knowledge or experience with AI.
Werk 4.0: Components in the project concept to clarify the holistic scope
Project consortium at the kick-off ©WvSC
Key facts
Framework for distributed communication
Semi-automated setup, orchestration and monitoring of distributed, networked computing nodes for the shop floor
Support for embedded, (factory) edge and cloud computing
Provision of programming interfaces (APIs) for application development
Efficient AI-based image recognition
Generation of synthetic image data
Use of Few-Shot Learning
Development of generative AI methods
IT / OT Convergence
Connection to industrial bus systems through development of appropriate connection elements / connectors
Integration and connection of different middleware/IoT standards
Integrative consideration of real-time communication via Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN)
Mobile quality assurance
Fast integration into workplace systems
New tasks can be learned within minutes
Intuitive worker-centred user guidance
PartnerS & CONSORTIUM
Mercedes-Benz AG
Werner-von-Siemens Centre for Industry and Science e.V.
Technische Universität Berlin
Fraunhofer IPK
Technische Universität Dresden
ASCon Systems GmbH
pi4_robotics GmbH
EKS InTec GmbH
MetraLabs GmbH
Cybus GmbH
5thIndustry GmbH
Funding
Federal Ministry for Economics and Climate Action
Program
The Federal Government's Economic Stimulus and Future Package - Digitisation of the Vehicle Manufacturers and Supplier Industry
Duration
01.2023 – 12.2025
Project Management Agency
VDI Technologiezentrum GmbH
Project Website
ProjeCt poster
Project poster (German) as printable PDF
This project is/was financed with by The Federal Government's Economic Stimulus and Future Package - Digitisation of the Vehicle Manufacturers and Supplier Industry. The author is responsible for the content of this publication.