Application of ubiquitous computing technology to the steel-plate piling process of ship construction

Abstract

A gigantic ship is constructed by assembling various types of ship blocks, each of which is made by the cut and paste of the steel-plates. The steel-plate piling process as the very initial stage of ship construction sorts and manages the steel-plates according to the ship blocks that the steel-plates are used to make. This process poses some problems such as process delay due to piling errors, safety vulnerability due to the handling of extra heavy-weight objects, and the uncertainty of work plan caused by lack of information in the pile spaces. We constructed a steel-plate piling process system by employing the ubiquitous computing technology to resolve such problems. The system was experimented on a work simulator that can simulate the steel-plate piling process. Workers can receive an appropriate or intelligent service through the context information of the smart work space that is managed in real time. © 2008 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.