The research objectives of this EArly-concept Grant for Exploratory Research (EAGER) award are to explore how emerging next-generation information technologies (IT) can be used to transform current and suggest new manufacturing service scenarios for increased accessibility, flexibility, efficiency and quality in the manufacture of single components and comprehensive products; and to identify current bottlenecks and suggest possible solutions for a significantly higher degree of utilization of these technologies in manufacturing. Several plausible futuristic manufacturing scenarios under the theme Cloud-Manufacturing, will be explored. The planned research tasks are: (1) Detailed delineation, characterization and quantification of manufacturing scenarios; (2) New network protocols; and (3) Semantic manufacturing-web and cloud computing requirements and advances.
If successful, this project will bring together experts in the area of manufacturing, computer networks and web-based programming to lay out a blueprint of enabling technologies and architectures for the envisioned futuristic Cloud-Manufacturing paradigm. The work will define future needs for Cloud-Manufacturing in terms of communication, data storage and processing needs. These needs will, therefore, pertain to both software and hardware developments. The work will stimulate more exciting research in the manufacturing, electrical engineering and computer science communities that could potentially lead to new manufacturing paradigms and many start-up companies. This project will offer graduate students multi-disciplinary training and collaborative experiences. Results will be disseminated through workshops, conferences and archival publications.
Overview: Cloud manufacturing is an envisioned manufacturing model that allows rapid and innovative product development at minimal cost by using the internet to narrow the gap between consumers and service providers. Consumers essentially have a direct access to service providers’ infrastructure via a cloud computing platform, which allows the consumer to take active part in the manufacturing cycle. Intellectual merit: During the course of this project a computer server application was developed to control the Testbed – Needle Punching Machine using the TCP/IP network protocol. Also a client application using the aforementioned protocol was also developed and used to connect the server application on the computer to which the Testbed – Needle Punching Machine is connected. With the aid of an IP camera, the client application can be used to control needle punching machine remotely to perform experiments on an already mounted sample. A remote data acquisition using a LabView webserver was setup on the server, which allowed the client application to download the force data after the remote experiment was a finished. The TCP/IP delay were measured, by benchmarking from the time a client sends a command to the server and the time the client receives a response back from the server. The delays results were stored and hosted on a website in real-time. The work identified the next step for cloud manufacturing as to find ways to reduce the delays by possibly using UDP which is faster that TCP/IP or protocols with a very reliable packet delivery system which are ideal for manufacturing sytems. The final step of this project was to construct a monitoring and control system for the RAPID Lumera Laser system. The monitoring system was successfully setup with two CISCO pan/zoom/tilt cameras which provide full visualization of the laser operation. Broader Impacts: The project provided a means to bridge two disciplines, manufacturing engineering and computer sciences. Additionally, it trained several graduate students, including one minority Ph.D. student. The work was presented at a national conference.
