Advances in Industrial Engineering Applications and Pratice: On the Implenentation of Product Model Interfaces in CIME

This paper address how neutral product model interfaces can be developed to provide intelligent and flexible means for information management in manufacturing of discrete mechanical products. The use of advanced computer based systems, such as CAD, CAE, CNC, and robotics, offers a potential for significant cost-savings and quality improvements in manufacturing of discrete mechanical products.

However, these systems are introduced into production as 'islands of information', and to benefit from the said potential, the systems must be integrated into an integrated manufacturing unit. Such units are known as Computer Integrated Manufacturing and Engineering (CIME) systems. The basic concept in CIME is to share and reuse information between the different computer based subsystems.

Consequently, for the integration purposes, the CIME systems are highly dependent on reliable product model interfaces to bridge the information islands together. The evolving international standard for the exchange of product model data, ISO 10303-STEP, has demonstrated the feasibility of neutral product data representation, especially within the conventional CAD area.

Other CA(X) areas of CIME, such as CACSD (Computer Aided Control Systems Design) and CAR (Computer Aided Robotics), have not, until now, propagated through the same evolution, even though similar integration measures are needed here as well. The interface development addressed here illustrates new and practical aspects of how the standardized STEP methodologies can be utilized to make neutral interfaces between the various CA(X) systems.

That is, interfaces including e.g. native CACSD and CAR data in addition to, e.g. the standardized STEP Part 42 data for geometry.