In recent years, the concept of "smart factory" was first introduced in Europe and the United States for the process industry. The process industry smart factory consists of three levels: business intelligence, operational intelligence and operational intelligence, and it is relatively easy to implement smart factory because of its high level of automation. Compared with the process industry, the discrete manufacturing industry first in the bottom manufacturing link due to the complexity of the production process, such as turning, milling, planing, grinding, casting, forging, riveting, welding on the production equipment intelligence requirements are very high, the investment is very large. In particular, equipment manufacturing, home appliances, automobiles, machinery, molds, aerospace, consumer electronics and other products mostly require intelligent products and intelligent design. Therefore, with the support of Made in China 2025 and Industry 4.0 information-physical fusion system CPS, the discrete manufacturing industry needs to realize advanced technology applications such as networking of production equipment, visualization of production data, paperless production documents, transparency of production process, and unmanned production site to achieve vertical, horizontal and end-to-end integration to realize high-quality, high-efficiency, low-consumption, clean and flexible production, so as to establish Intelligent factory based on industrial big data and "Internet+".
Networking of production equipment to realize the "Internet of Things" in the workshop
Industrial Internet of Things (IoT) is proposed to "Made in China 2025" and Industry 4.0 to provide a new breakthrough. The Internet of Things refers to a variety of information sensing devices, real-time collection of any need to monitor, connect, interact with objects or processes and other information needed, the purpose is to achieve things and things, things and people, all the items and the network connection, easy identification, management and control. Traditional industrial production uses M2M (MachinetoMachine) communication mode to achieve communication between devices, while IoT achieves intelligent, interactive and seamless connection between people, devices and systems through the ThingstoThings communication method.
In discrete manufacturing enterprise workshop, CNC turning, milling, planing, grinding, casting, forging, riveting, welding, machining center, etc. are the main production resources. In the production process, all the equipment and work stations will be unified network management, so that between equipment and equipment, equipment and computer can be network communication, equipment and work station personnel closely related. For example: CNC programmers can program on their own computers, upload the processing program to the DNC server, equipment operators can download the required program through the equipment controller at the production site, after the completion of the processing task, and then through the DNC network will be back to the server CNC program, by the program manager or process personnel for comparison or archiving, the entire production process to achieve network, traceability The whole production process can be networked and managed.
Production data visualization, using big data analysis for production decisions
After "Made in China 2025" was proposed, information technology and industrialization have been rapidly integrated, and information technology has penetrated into all aspects of the industrial chain of discrete manufacturing enterprises, and technologies such as bar code, 2D code, RFID, industrial sensor, industrial automatic control system, industrial Internet of Things, ERP, CAD/CAM/CAE/CAI In particular, the new generation of information technologies such as Internet, mobile Internet and Internet of Things are applied in the industrial field, and the discrete manufacturing enterprises have entered a new stage of development of Internet industry, and the data they possess are becoming more and more abundant. The production lines of discrete manufacturing enterprises are running at high speed, and the amount of data generated, collected and processed by production equipment is much larger than the data generated by computers and humans in the enterprises, and the requirement for real-time data is also higher.
At the production site, data is collected every few seconds, and using this data enables many forms of analysis, including equipment start-up rate, spindle run rate, spindle load rate, run rate, failure rate, productivity, overall equipment utilization (OEE), parts qualification rate, quality percentage, etc. First, in terms of production process improvement, using this big data in the production process will allow you to analyze the entire production process and understand how each step is being executed. Once a process deviates from the standard process, an alarm signal will be generated, and errors or bottlenecks can be identified more quickly, which will make it easier to solve the problem. Using big data technology, it is also possible to create virtual models of product production processes to simulate and optimize them. When all process and performance data can be reconstructed in the system, this transparency will help manufacturing companies improve their production processes. For example, in terms of energy consumption analysis, the use of sensors to centrally monitor all production processes during the production of equipment can identify abnormal or peak energy consumption situations, so that energy consumption can be optimized during the production process, and analysis of all processes will greatly reduce energy consumption.
Paperless production documents for efficient and green manufacturing
Building a green manufacturing system, constructing a green factory, realizing clean production, resourceful waste and low-carbon energy is one of the important strategies of Made in China 2025 to realize "big manufacturing country" to "strong manufacturing country". At present, discrete manufacturing enterprises produce a wide range of paper documents, such as process cards, part blueprints, three-dimensional models, tool lists, quality documents, CNC programs, etc. Most of these paper documents are scattered management, not easy to quickly find, centralized sharing and real-time tracking, and easy to produce a lot of paper waste, lost, etc.. After paperless management of production documents, staff can quickly check, browse and download the production information they need at the production site, and the information generated in the production process can be archived and saved instantly, which greatly reduces the manual transmission and flow of paper-based documents, thus eliminating the loss of documents and data, further improving the efficiency of production preparation and production operations, and realizing green and paperless production.
Transparent production process, the "nerve" system of smart factory
The "Made in China 2025" clearly proposes to promote the intelligence of the manufacturing process, through the construction of smart factories, to promote the simulation and optimization of the manufacturing process, digital control, real-time monitoring of state information and adaptive control, and then realize the intelligent control of the entire process. In the discrete manufacturing industries such as machinery, automobile, aviation, shipbuilding, light industry, household appliances and electronic information, the core purpose of developing smart manufacturing is to expand the product value space, focusing on the automation of single equipment and product intelligence to achieve value growth based on the improvement of production efficiency and product effectiveness. Therefore, its smart factory construction mode is to promote the production equipment (production line) intelligence, through the introduction of various types of intelligent equipment in line with the production needs, the establishment of workshop-level intelligent production units based on manufacturing execution system MES, to improve the ability of accurate manufacturing, agile manufacturing, transparent manufacturing.
In the production site of discrete manufacturing enterprises, MES plays a great role in realizing the automation, intelligence and digitalization of the production process. First, MES optimizes the management of the entire production process from order placement to product completion with the help of information transfer, reduces the non-value-added activities within the enterprise, effectively guides the factory production operation process, and improves the enterprise's on-time delivery capability. Secondly, MES provides basic information of production activities in the form of two-way interaction between the enterprise and the supply chain, so that planning, production and resources can be closely coordinated to ensure that decision makers and managers at all levels can grasp changes at the production site in the shortest possible time, make accurate judgments and formulate rapid response measures to ensure that production plans are reasonably and quickly revised, production processes are smooth, and resources are fully and effectively utilized. The production plan is revised reasonably and quickly, the production process is smooth, and the resources are fully and effectively utilized, thus maximizing the production efficiency.
Unmanned production site, truly "unmanned" factory
"Made in China 2025" has promoted the widespread use of industrial robots, robotic arms and other intelligent equipment, making unmanned factory manufacturing possible. In the production site of discrete manufacturing enterprises, CNC machining centers, intelligent robots, CMMs and other flexible manufacturing units are scheduled automatically, and workpieces, materials and tools are loaded and unloaded automatically to achieve an unattended fully automated production mode (LightsOutMFG). In the case of uninterrupted unit automation production, management production tasks are prioritized and suspended, production status in the management unit is viewed remotely, and if problems are encountered in production, once solved, automated production is immediately resumed, and the whole production process does not require human participation, truly realizing "unmanned" intelligent production.
To achieve the "upgrade" from a large manufacturing country to a strong manufacturing country, "Made in China 2025" has become the most powerful strategic driver. Gallup is the first explorer and practitioner of "Made in China 2025". Based on 25 years of global leading technology and 15 years of localization experience in China, Gallup has proposed five directions of smart factory for discrete manufacturing industry, aiming to break organizational boundaries and integrate the whole production site into the management network with the productivity engine of global advanced smart factory total solution (MES-SFC), which is profoundly changing manufacturing mode, process and even the structure of the whole manufacturing industry. This innovation with future competitiveness will strongly promote the transformation and upgrading of the whole manufacturing industry, and also give discrete manufacturing enterprises a unique new technology experience and set a successful model for the industry.