PROBABILISTIC PRECISION PROCESS PLANNING ― P4

摘要

Process planning was widely researched in the last twenty years with focus on automation of planning procedure and feature recognition. These strategies are relevant but not complete for the current requirements in the automobile industry. Factories of the digital future would require simulation and optimization of processes and process chains before establishing the actual line using very specific procedures. There is tremendous scope for reducing significantly the lead-time for production and costs by employing planning tools for virtual machining. P4 is designed to address challenges faced by automobile industries to integrate developments in technology based software and pave way for defect free process plans. P4 presents a novel way to plan each process as an independent entity that exists as part of a sequence. The principal application of P4 is in mass production, but can be extended to other production schemes. It is a two part scheme; the first step is to create the basic framework and models for each process with the objectives while the second is to fill in the necessary data and link pieces of relevant software. A five step solution procedure involving statistical principles is used to generate the final numerical values supplied to the shop floor. Face milling is used as an example in this paper to demonstrate the various concepts that form the core of P4.