Disassembly Automation: Automated Systems with Cognitive Abilities

205 Pages·2015·9.96 MB·English

by  Supachai Vongbunyong

Sustainable Production, Life Cycle Engineering and Management
Series Editors: Christoph Herrmann, Sami Kara
Supachai Vongbunyong
Wei Hua Chen
Disassembly
Automation
Automated Systems with Cognitive
Abilities
Sustainable Production, Life Cycle Engineering
and Management
Series editors
Christoph Herrmann, Braunschweig, Germany
Sami Kara, Sydney, Australia
Modern production enables a high standard of living worldwide through products
and services. Global responsibility requires a comprehensive integration of sustain-
able development fostered by new paradigms, innovative technologies, methods and
tools as well as business models. Minimizing material and energy usage, adapting
material and energy flows to better fit natural process capacities, and changing con-
sumption behaviour are important aspects of future production. A life cycle per-
spective and an integrated economic, ecological and social evaluation are essential
requirements in management and engineering. This series will focus on the issues
and latest developments towards sustainability in production based on life cycle
thinking.
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/10615
Supachai Vongbunyong · Wei Hua Chen
Disassembly Automation
Automated Systems with Cognitive Abilities
1 3
Supachai Vongbunyong Wei Hua Chen
School of Mechanical and Manufacturing School of Mechanical and Manufacturing
Engineering, Sustainable Manufacturing Engineering, Sustainable Manufacturing
and Life Cycle Engineering Research and Life Cycle Engineering Research
Group Group
University of New South Wales University of New South Wales
Sydney Sydney
Australia Australia
ISSN 2194-0541 ISSN 2194-055X (electronic)
Sustainable Production, Life Cycle Engineering and Management
ISBN 978-3-319-15182-3 ISBN 978-3-319-15183-0 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-15183-0
Library of Congress Control Number: 2015932072
Springer Cham Heidelberg New York Dordrecht London
© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015
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Dedicated to Our Families
Arpa and Sumeth Vongbunyong,
Prapassri Leekphai
—Supachai Vongbunyong
Foreword
Disassembly, as a step in the treatment of end-of-life products, can allow
the recovery of embodied value left within disposed products as well as the
appropriate separation of potentially hazardous components. In the end-of-life
(EOL) treatment industries, disassembly has largely been limited to manual labor,
which is expensive in developed countries. Automation is one possible solution for
economic feasibility. However, the efforts of disassembly automation have been
hindered due to the uncertainty and the complexity associated with disassembly
processes.
In this book, the authors present a number of aspects to be considered in the
development of disassembly automation, including the mechanical system, vision
system and intelligent planner. In addition, unlike automation for assembly
processes, disassembly automation needs to deal with a number of complexities
and uncertainties in products and process levels. In order to address this problem,
a principle of cognitive robotics is implemented on the system to increase the
flexibility and the degree of autonomy required. The proposed cognitive robotics
system has been tested and validated by using the EOL LCD screens.
The cognitive robotic application in disassembly represents a critical step
forward in the current state of research with an application-oriented scope. As
a result it paves the way towards achieving automation in disassembly, hence
progress in industry and in the research towards sustainability in production.
Prof. Christoph Herrmann
Technische Universität Braunschweig
Prof. Sami Kara
The University of New South Wales
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Preface
As the world’s population exponentially grows, consumption rates and the demand
for new products also increase dramatically. As a consequence, a great number of
end-of-life (EOL) products are continuously being disposed of, leading to a num-
ber of environmental problems. Responsible EOL treatment—which may include
reusing, recycling or remanufacturing products or parts—is desirable in dealing
with these disposed products. These processes can be beneficial both environmen-
tally and economically. Waste is minimised, while valuable components and mate-
rials are recovered.
The disassembly of products is one of the primary steps of EOL treatment pro-
cesses, and involves the extraction and segregation of the desired components,
parts or materials from the product. Disassembly does not only input towards EOL
treatment, but also allows the repair and maintenance of products. However, most
of this process is economically infeasible due to time consumption, process diffi-
culty and expensive labour costs. Consequently, the option of disassembly is often
ignored in industry.
Replacement of human labour by automation has been successful in increasing
the cost-effectiveness of many industries, especially manufacturing and production
processes. Therefore, the implementation of an automated system in the disassem-
bly process is considered as one possible solution. However, the disassembly pro-
cess involves a number of challenging problems and cannot be considered as the
reversal of the assembly process. A number of difficulties arise due to three main
aspects: the physical uncertainties associated with the end-of-life product condi-
tion, the large variety within the one product category, and complexities in process
planning and operation. Therefore, disassembly automation needs to be designed
to be flexible and is robust enough to overcome these issues.
This book provides an overview of the design of disassembly automation,
along with a case study example of the development of a new system based on
the research, “Cognitive robotics in the disassembly of products”, conducted at
the University of New South Wales, Australia. The general concept of product dis-
assembly is introduced and a review of the existing disassembly automation sys-
tems is presented. After that, the book provides an overview of the general system
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x Preface
set-up, followed by detail into each primary operating module of the automated
system. This book is organised as follows.
Chapter 1 describes the importance of product disassembly as a key step in the
end-of-life treatment process. This chapter also presents an overview of the current
research direction in the field of disassembly.
Chapter 2 provides an overview and literature review of the disassembly
process. The literature shows that a number of techniques have already been
developed at the planning and operational levels, typically for optimising the dis-
assembly process for economic feasibility. These techniques can be implemented
in both manual and autonomous disassembly.
Chapter 3 considers the disassembly system as the integration of a number of
operating modules working together to achieve the goal. An overview of this con-
figuration is described. Existing research regarding the development of a (semi-)
autonomous disassembly system and disassembly tools is reviewed. In addi-
tion, the set-up of the workstation and system framework used in this research is
explained.
Chapter 4 provides an overview of perception in the disassembly system.
Detection techniques, in regard to hardware and software used in existing research,
are reviewed. This chapter also describes the implementation of the vision system
in this research, including the detection of components based on common features
and coordinate mapping using the depth camera.
Chapter 5 explains the principle of cognitive robotics. The cognitive robotics
agent is an intelligent planner that controls the behaviour of the system in order to
overcome the variations and uncertainties in the disassembly process. The behav-
iour is influenced by four cognitive functions, namely reasoning, execution moni-
toring, learning and revision.
Chapter 6 describes the integration of the aforementioned operating modules
into a complete disassembly system. The software system applies the vision sys-
tem, operation plans and the principle of cognitive robotics to a disassembly cell
specifically designed for disassembling LCD screens. The detailed configuration
of the system and additional information specific to the case-study product are also
explained.
Chapter 7 presents the conclusions developed as a result of this research in the
development of a disassembly automation system. Technical perspectives of the
system, its economic feasibility and the future work are also presented.
Acknowledgments
First, we would like to thank our supervisors Profs. Sami Kara and Maurice
Pagnucco for the great opportunity given to us to work on this exciting research
topic. They have always given the best support in terms of research direction,
theory and technical help, which have been crucial in producing this work.
Next, we would like to thank the School of Mechanical and Manufacturing
Engineering for their provision of research funding and facilities. In addition, we
would like to thank the workshop and technical staff members, Martyn, Seetha,
Russell, Alfred, Ian, Andy, Subash, Radha and Steve, for their great technical
support and the manufacture of the hardware parts. We would like to thank Drs.
Erik van Voorthuysen and David Rajaratnam (CSE) for their valuable suggestions
and comments in the early stage of the disassembly cell set-up in regard to robot-
ics and programming. In addition, we would like to thank TAD NSW Disability
Services for supplying and donating LCD screens for testing.
We would also like to thank the members of the Sustainable Manufacturing
and Life Cycle Engineering Research Group (SMLCE@UNSW), in particular
Dr. Suphunnika Ibbotson, Dr. Wen Li, Dr. Seung Jin Kim, Dr. Bernard Kornfeld,
Dr. Kanda Boonsothonsatit, Dr. Rachata Khumboon, Pouya Ghadimi Karahrodi,
SeyedHamed MoosaviRad, Smaeil Mousavi, Wei Lau, Samira Alvandi and Scott
Ibbotson, for the sharing of ideas, valuable comments, their warm welcomes
and all the other assistance that they have provided. Moreover, we would like to
thank our German colleagues, in particular Prof. Dr.-Ing. Christoph Herrmann,
Dr. Tobius Luger, Gerrit Bogdanski and other researchers from JGARG for their
insights into the disassembly of LCD screens, LCA and manufacturing.
I, Wei Hua, would additionally like to thank the crew at UNSW Mechatronics,
in particular Dr. Mark Whitty, Dr. Jose Guivant, Dr. Ngai Kwok and Michael
Woods for the technical and personal support they have provided, and all I have
learnt in our various conversations. Thanks also to the MoFA group at the Institute
of Machine Tools and Production Technology (IWF), TU Braunschweig, where I
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