Hardware-in-the-Loop Mechatronic Virtual Prototyping of a high-speed capsule filling machine

Abstract

In the field of pharmaceutical processing, last generation automatic machines autonomously modify their behavior in order to achieve the best manufacturing quality and productivity despite ever changing process requirements. Mechatronics, as a synergistic integration of electro-mechanical equipment and software control logics, enables such adaptive self-optimizing behaviors. Unfortunately, due to the complex interactions between the different technologies, the final performance of these systems can be effectively validated and optimized only on a physical prototype, with limited possibilities to introduce possible design changes. Therefore, in order to enable validation/optimization of high performance machinery during engineering design stage, a mechatronic Virtual Prototyping (VP) technology is strongly needed. Within this context, the present work discusses a mechatronic VP method based on a Hardware-in-the-Loop, hybrid-process simulation approach, where interactive real-time simulations can effectively assess the real final performance under changing process scenarios. In particular, a case study concerning a high-speed automatic machines for pharmaceutical capsules filling is thoroughly discussed.

Engineering Method and Tool for the Complete Virtual Commissioning of Robotic Cells

“…Multi-software frameworks have been widely investigated by academic researchers in recent years, and not only regarding VC. They have been employed, e.g., for the design of servo-actuated mechanisms [12,35,36], the dynamic characterization of robotic systems [37], and for the tuning of robot controllers [38].…”

“…Since modern markets continually demand flexible and customized products, development and commissioning processes are often very compressed [8]. Simulation and virtual prototyping technologies are consolidating their role in transferring testing and optimization activities in virtual environments, pursuing realism, easiness of use and reliability [9][10][11][12]. Their application extends to the whole product life cycle [7,13] as well as the related production systems.…”

Digital twin for smart manufacturing: a review of concepts towards a practical industrial implementation

“…Therefore, the computational time is not significant because the ultimate purpose is the accuracy and completeness of the simulation. As an example, an emerging trend in the area of 'Digital Model' or 'Digital Shadow', is represented by systems for the programming and commissioning of robotic cells (Burghardt et al 2020;Kousi et al 2019;Pellicciari, Vergnano, and Berselli 2014;Pérez et al 2020). The programming phase can be performed in an off-line mode, and the generated program can be transferred to the real system at a later time (Gadaleta, Pellicciari, and Berselli 2019).…”