Simulation

Virtual Engineering is an important tool to verify and optimise products in early design phases. For the development of innovative complex technical systems the applied models should comprehend the most important product properties. Up to now there are deficits in modelling and evaluating the acoustic behaviour of technical products although this is important in areas with rigid ergonomic and comfort requirements, e.g. in the consumer goods and automobile industries. In order to overcome these deficits, at the Ilmenau University of Technology a flexible audiovisual stereoscopic projection system (FASP) has been constructed. Consequently, investigations of the sound effects of machine components, machines, cars and other products as well as psycho-acoustic assessments of designed products in a virtual environment can be realized.

The market-oriented product development describes a focusing of needs, which leads ideally to high product quality and profitability. In the context of “Digital Factory” this paper focuses on the integrated product and process design, which is oriented to the physical part of the product. Due to the high product complexity, shorter product life cycles and increased competition situation is the product development faced with new challenges. Both the speed and the quality of planning should be improved further. Only the combination of organizational approaches and information technologies like for example “Simultaneous Engineering” and the “Digital Factory” promises a sufficient increase of planning efficiency. The following paper deals with existing methodologies and promising approaches in the field of “Digital Factory” against the background of an integrated product and process design. Referring to the requirements of logistics planning, an early integration of ...

The use of virtual engineering techniques in the field of product development requires a continuity of all digital development processes, workflows, tools and data. While this continuity is state-of-the-art on a level of geometric description it is still not achieved on a functional description level of product features. This paper analyses the state of the development and current problems in the process of introduction of virtual engineering in machine and plant engineering enterprises. Furthermore, the authors present their current research works in development of continuous digital process chains for product development.

In development projects, a delay in connection with budget overruns is often the consequence of unrealistic scheduling. A simulation based approach for modeling development projects has been developed to support the project planner and will be presented in this paper. This novel approach allows the modeling and simulation of the project-specific structural organization and the process organization as well as the typical non-deterministic project behavior. Therefore, a realistic scheduling and resource allocation of complex development projects can be achieved. The application of the approach in projects of our industrial partners in the chemical industry has shown the suitability of the developed tools.

Today continuous planning is a prerequisite for competitiveness. Methods are required, that allow the handling of complexity in rapidly changing and complex networks. Model based methods provide insight in these networks and therefore help realizing advantages in competition. The vision of a modeling plant for building the required models effectively and in an industrial scale and concepts for long term usage of models will make model-based methods attractive for the industry. The validation of planning results using a model will advance the quality of planning and thereby create advantages in competition.

A widely established tool for modeling, analysing, evaluating and optimizing in manufacturing planning is the discrete-event material flow simulation. Considerable benefits of using simulation show the necessity of increasingly applying simulation in the planning process. However, applying material flow simulation is also very costly. Results generated from simulation studies can be used for creating simulation-based characteristic diagrams. These diagrams allow the reduction of expenditures required for modeling and experimentation. Simulation-based characteristic diagrams can be used for efficiently solving frequent simulation problems. This paper introduces a methodology for reducing the expenditures required for creating simulation-based characteristic diagrams. The application of this methodology is demonstrated in an example.

This paper presents a simulation study that has been carried out at the Container Terminal Altenwerder in Hamburg in order to examine various topics related to the dispatching of automated guided vehicles (AGVs). After on overview of the structure of the simulation model, the application to the project is discussed. Several simulation experiments are summarized in order to demonstrate the broad applicability of the model.

This technical contribution presents a digital planning environment for an integrated facility layout and logistics planning. The aim is a noticeable reduction of time and effort for middle- and long-term facility planning and production planning. Therefore current data from the shop floor and order management are provided in an object-oriented consistent digital structure. This data is used to forecast the need for action and to deduct alternative solutions. Planning becomes more effective, long-term planning tasks become day-to-day activities so that the flexibility of the enterprise increases.

High dynamics and structural complexity in current and future logistic systems are complicating central planning and control. For enabling a more decentralised and autonomous control, communication between the elements of the logistical network are necessary for the provisioning of the information needed. This article details the modelling of the communication between the components. This modelling contains source and sink of the information as well as the amount of data, frequency of transmission, quality of service and the moment of transmission for a reasonable usage of the information. The technical feasibility with current and upcoming communication systems is evaluated under consideration of the model.

Production and logistics networks are characterized by an increasing dynamic and structural complexity, which makes an efficient planning more difficult. Observed non-linear dynamic effects, which in case of similar causes can lead to different results, contribute additionally to this problem. As a consequence strong inventory fluctuations can appear among others, which represent a strong economically load for network participants. The simulation-supported analysis of these connections is the main focus of this article. Moreover as a result of the analysis ways and means are pointed out, which will help to react more adequately to the given problems.