Elsevier

Neurocomputing

Volume 348, 5 July 2019, Pages 74-81
Neurocomputing

Research on virtual haptic disassembly platform considering disassembly process

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neucom.2018.05.120Get rights and content

Abstract

The speed of equipment repair and maintenance becomes a key factor in improving the production efficiency. Though the process of equipment disassembly is complex, long cycle and high cost, the combination of disassembly sequence planning and virtual disassembly platform can solve this problem effectively. The main contents of this paper include: (1) Petri net and genetic algorithm is used to solve the disassembly sequence planning and design a variety of disassembly paths. (2) In order to develop a virtual disassembly platform with more real experience, the physical properties of the equipment and parts are analyzed in the process of disassembly, and the real-time construction method of the physical model is studied; (3) Taking the reducer as an example, the platform of virtual disassembly with force feedback is developed and enhanced the real sense of virtual disassembly by added haptic interaction, which can finish the virtual disassembly under the guidance of the disassembly sequence optimized. Thus, virtual haptic disassembly platform considering disassembly process improves the effectiveness and authenticity of training, learning, and process validation of disassembly.

Introduction

The mechanical equipment have widely used in Urban construction, military aerospace, port logistics, manufacturing and other fields. Disassembly is necessary in the process of equipment maintenance, scrap, etc. Therefore, how to carry out disassembly of equipment efficiently and economically becomes a problem that needs to be solved urgently. Due to the cumbersome, long period and high cost of the disassembly of equipment, virtual disassembly could be used to solve these problems faultlessly. At present, the research on virtual disassembly mainly focuses on two aspects: improving interaction experience and simulating disassembly process. The improvement of disassembly interaction could be seen from the development of interactive devices. The human-computer interaction has evolved from the initial visual interaction to the multimodal interaction of visual, auditory, tactile and other sensory inputs.

As an important way of information communication between man and nature, haptics has been widely applied in the field of virtual disassembly. Adding physical properties to the virtual disassembly system to enhance the virtual disassembly interaction experience are research hotspots. A set of virtual disassembly system has developed in [1] by Stefano, Caselli et al. Physical attributes were added in the system. It also explored the design of automatic disassembly planning. The virtual disassembly system with multi-mode have developed in [2] by Rodríguez et al. The conclusion was that could make consumer personally on the scene and also could enhance training efficiency. Gaonkar et al. have developed an immersive virtual environment (IVE) in [3] through JACK software package to explore the simulation of assembly and maintenance. The IVE captures finger movements in real-time by using Cyberglove. But it could not provide force feedback. Marzano et al. advanced a new virtual reality framework in [4], VR_MATE. It could reduce product development time and improve work efficiency, but the high cost of system construction cost limits its development. Jiang et al. have developed an assembly system through haptic technology in [5]. And the experiments have proved that the haptic based assembly operation could make the users achieve the training goal more efficiently compared with the traditional interaction. Xia et al. have studied the application of haptic in [6] about rigid and non-rigid body, and explored the relationship between geometric model and physical model. Lu et al. were optimized in the workspace of force feedback device in [7]. It enhanced the visual interactive experience.

For the simulation of disassembly process, the main work is the planning of disassembly sequence and path. There were many studies on disassembly sequences, most of method proposed considered the geometric contact and collision relationships among the components [8], [9], [10]. Based on this, Popescu and Iacob [11] introduced a disassembly method based on connection interface and mobility operator concepts which influenced recycling, maintenance, repairing and component/material re-using—essential aspects for a sustainable development. Liu et al. [12] presented a disassembly sequence planning method based on Petri-net. About disassembly sequence evaluation method, Wang et al. [13] focused on the evaluation of disassembly operations in a virtual environment, a method based on five new criteria-visibility of a part, disassembly angles, number of tools, orientation changing and sub-assembly stability- proposed here. Chen et al. [14] proposed a method that provides the feasibility to integrate human muscle fatigue into disassembly sequence evaluation via mechanical energy expenditure when performing disassembly operation simulations. There were also many studies on adding new content to virtual disassembly. Popescu et al. [15] came up with the integration between a software tool for automatic generation of A/D sequences and an industrial robot programmed,to use these data for its motion control. Qiu et al. [16] integrated a virtual human model into a VR environment for interactive assembly and disassembly operations.

From these studies, it could be illustrated that there are many separately researches on virtual disassembly system and disassembly sequence planning. In order to verify the feasibility of disassembly process planning and improve the effectiveness of disassembly training, the goal of this paper is proposing a new idea about combining disassembly sequence planning with haptic disassembly to build a comprehensive virtual disassembly platform. The main contents include: (1) An optimization method of disassembly sequence planning based on Petri net and genetic algorithm is designed. (2) The mapping process of force calculation of force feedback device is studied to achieve real force feedback during the disassembly process. (3) Taking the reducer as an example, the virtual disassembly platform is developed by combining the disassembly sequence planning with the technology of force feedback. In this way, a feasible disassembly plan is applied to guide the disassembly training and make the disassembly training more targeted, which can effectively improve the efficiency of the disassembly process and save costs.

Section snippets

System design

In this paper, the disassembly platform is developed mainly for achieving the haptic interactive disassembly with sequence planning considered by using force feedback device. Therefore, it includes two modules: virtual disassembly module and sequence planning module, as shown in Fig. 1.

The disassembly module contains automatic disassembly, manual disassembly, force feedback disassembly and several related auxiliary function. Of course, the force feedback disassembly is the most important part.

Disassembly sequence planning and selection based on petri net

Petri net is an efficient graphical modeling and analysis tool for discrete event system which was proposed by Dr. Carl A.Petri in 1962. It has been widely applied in communication, manufacturing, logistics and other fields. In this paper, we found the priority matrix of equipment disassembly based on the characteristics of the equipment structure, and built the disassembly model of equipment with Petri net. Finally, we got the optimal product disassembly sequence by genetic algorithm

Construction of physical model

Fundamentally, all of the objects in the real world own physical properties. In traditional virtual interaction, objects usually are modeled as geometric models without physical properties. Interactive devices such as keyboard, mouse, Data Glove and so on are important interactive device, but they can not provide the physical property in the real interaction process. It could build a relatively physical model to enhance the interactive experience by studying the integration of physical

Simulation of reducer based on force feedback device and sequence planning

After the disassembly sequences calculated by MATLAB and output the results in “Disassembly Sequences.txt”, the program reads the data. According to the data read in the document, OSG provides the different guidance information for disassembly operation, as shown in Fig. 10. The guidance information mainly achieved by HUD. Therefore, users could complete the disassembly operation under the guidance of reasonable sequence.

The disassembly operation of the reducer that considered physical

Conclusion

In this paper, according to analyzing the traditional disassembly process of typical equipment (reducer), the planning and optimization of disassembly sequence is completed, which considered disassembly time and cost as the evaluation criterion of Petri net. Some physical properties is added through OpenHaptics in the disassembly platform by using force feedback device. The physical attributes such as friction, hardness, inertia and gravity improved the authenticity greatly in the interactive

Acknowledgment

This work is supported by The Research Fund of Zhejiang Low Voltage Electrical Engineering Technology, and Research Center Research and Educational Research Program of Wuhan University of Technology (2015053).

YanFang Yang Virtual reality and its application; Computer Simulation; Computer Aided Design and Manufacturing;

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