Design and implementation of intelligent automated production-line control system

Abstract

Owing to the different consumption habits of people, the market has rapidly changed, and customized demands have increased in recent years. This issue has led to the need for manufacturing industry to improve their production-process automation system control to become faster and more flexible. An intelligent automated production-line control system (IAPLCS) is proposed in this study, in which a graphic control system (GCS) is designed to integrate equipment communications in automated production. This system runs complex packaged programs for function blocks, which enable users to easily build function blocks in GCS. Users can plan the control flow of the system to control the machine operation. Not only is a web interface set in the IAPLCS, which makes it easier for users to operate and monitor, but also Internet-of-Things (IoT) sensors can be added for data collection and analysis based on the characteristics of the production line and equipment. Finally, the proposed control system was implemented in an actual production line to verify its feasibility.