December/January 2019

| 16 | December/January 2020 www.smartmachinesandfactories.com | FEATURES | 4.0, SICK AG. “Most people understand the concept of Industry 4.0 by now, but relatively few have had the chance to turn a theoretical idea into practical experience. It has been a rare privilege, and we have often felt like explorers and pioneers.” Industry 4.0 Think of Industry 4.0, and most people might understand the concept of digitised connectivity between machines that makes production processes more transparent and manageable globally. Certainly, autonomous digital production and control were an essential foundation in the blueprint for the Hochdorf facility. Yet what sets the factory apart as a flagbearer for Industry 4.0, above all, is its fully-flexible operation, down to the almost-mythical ‘lot size of one’. While its annual capacity may be upward of 1.2 million pieces, there are virtually no limits to the variety that is conceivable. Small production batches can be easily accommodated at an affordable price for customers. SICK can react flexibly to customer priorities, even at short notice, using a highly-responsive production control system. So how has this been achieved? Firstly, despite its futuristic feel, the factory is not simply conceived as a fully automated and robotic environment from which humans are shunned. Alongside 12 automated universal machines, each with several complementary technical processes or ‘services’ on board, such as robot gluing, vision camera inspection, or a housing assembly process, there are nine manual workstations and one hybrid workstation. As a working production facility, the factory has been planned to meet commercial and pragmatic realities, rather than indulging higher Industry 4.0 ideals for their own sake, stresses Müller. “Using both automated and manual processes leads to the most efficient and economical level of automation for us. Our material flows are handled both by automated carts and people, and we still use some manual as well as automated assembly processes.” To start a production order, the product variant requested by the customer is configured online in the production control system. All the data to configure the sensor is taken from the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system: the product specification and quantities as well as the steps required for its manufacture. Following the recipe SICK has called this the customer’s “recipe” used to progress each Manufacturing Order (MO) through the facility and make best use of the workspace. Material transport is handled by the AGCs that receive their orders via the network and support flexible production by optimally linking the production steps. Rather like calling a taxi, the nearest AGC reacts. All workflows are managed by the high-performance production control software developed in-house by SICK. The system sends information to the machines and receives constant feedback in return. All of the contributing elements, sensors, machines and people, are organised remotely, networked, and are in constant communication with each other. As a result, the system is super- responsive to juggle customer priorities and to closely track order progress. Orders are prioritised and the production modules and staff are deployed most effectively. “Just in time” production is enabled. The production manager can concentrate on optimising efficiency rather than having to spend time scheduling which machines to use. Dashboard A dashboard enables the system to be interrogated in real time to assess the current status of each production cell, the progress of each order and to monitor key production performance parameters. All information generated during production is stored in the cloud, linked to the serial number of each product. Production history can be interrogated to establish where any problems may have originated. Naturally, SICK sensors of all kinds: smart sensors, laser scanners and vision cameras are at the heart of every process. Each production cell/module uses SICK sensors for its own automated quality control using an integrated camera Automated Optical Inspection (AOI) system, to