Original Date: 11/03/1996
Revision Date: 01/18/2007

Partnered with industry, academia, and professional organizations, Oak Ridge Centers for Manufacturing Technology (ORCMT) is developing advanced open architecture controls to improve competitive manufacturing operations. This endeavor develops, enhances, and evaluates advanced control systems and components for material removal, assembly, and dimensional inspection applications. Active projects include agile production operations, dimensional inspection machines, control of pneumatic positioning devices; and evaluation of open architecture controls.

For the dimensional inspection machines project, a Moore M32 measuring machine has been configured as a Y/Z/Theta inspection machine and retro-fitted with an in-house designed Intelligent Inspection System (IIS). The in- house system consists of an open controller with commercially-available analysis software. Objectives of the project include porting the IIS to a Windows NT computing platform, developing enhancements for coordinate measuring machine operations, and producing a Dual Y/Z/Theta inspection machine. The mechanisms could minimize training and maintenance costs while ensuring long-term usability.

For the pneumatic positioning devices project, ORCMT is developing advanced methodologies to control the velocity and the position of pneumatic devices. Using an in-house controls development system, ORCMT developed and simulated pneumatic control algorithms. Next, it evaluated these algorithms by connecting a pneumatic cylinder to the controls development system. Results indicate that the project has achieved a positioning accuracy that is almost one order of magnitude better than existing techniques. The mechanisms could replace hydraulic or electromechanical devices with cleaner, faster, and inexpensive pneumatics.

Open architecture controls represent an essential tool for integrating future technologies with present control strategies. The endeavor of developing advanced open architecture controls may enable Oak Ridge to survive the production constraints predicted for the year 2000 and beyond.

For more information see the Point of Contact for this survey.