Design of flexible assembly systems: extension of the conceptual diagrams to the modelling of multi-product manufacturing

In order to solve the problem of characterization and choice of equipment for flexible assembly systems in the multi-product case, the Laboratoire d´Automatique de Besancon developed an original modelling tool, conceptual diagrams. This tool is integrated into a systematic method for the rational design of any flexible assembly system. After analysing first the different objects that constitutes an assembly system, the paper describes an analysis of a product´s family in order to introduce the notion of generic operations, that is used for the description of the multi-product assembly plans. Then, the authors describe the modelling tool, the conceptual diagrams, which is based on coloured and temporized Petri nets and which is able to integrate the functionalities of: describing every complex object of the assembly system and every assembly operation realised by these objects, allowing the distinction of the sub-set of operation performed by every elementary object, describing the part of every elementary object during the realization of a particular operation; thus, the functionalities of a particular resource may be determined through the description of every part of this resource. The last paragraph of this paper is the presentation of extensions of the proposed modelling, in order to support a hierarchized synthesis process through different comprehension levels that match the proposed resources classification