MACHINE WORK PLANNING USING WORKPIECE AGENTS IN AN AUTONOMOUS DECENTRALIZED MANUFACTURING SYSTEM

摘要

In this paper, a workpiece agent is proposed for the configuration of an autonomous decentralized manufacturing system which flexibly responds to high-mix, very-low volume production. When a blank workpiece is put on to the production line, the workpiece agent is dynamically generated with the product model. According to the state of each machine tool on the shop floor, the agent plans the machining processes by itself. Then the workpiece agent determines the selection of the machine tools for each machining step and obtains a schedule in real time through the negotiation among two or more workpiece agents aiming to increase efficiency of the whole manufacturing system. Trial implementation of a workpiece agent has been done.