Abstract:
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During the last decades, cost reduction has become a worldwide spread topic in the most of the companies. In particular, in the manufacturing industry, innovation is a key to continuous improvement. Thus, innovation is clearly vital and a prerequisite for a properly running of a company and it is closely related to the phenomenon of the product life cycle and obsolescence.
The following project intends to carry out an innovative study of the possible implementation of an automated final inspection in one area of ABB AG Company, which might reduce time losses while contributing to a reduction of costs. The area in which this project has been focused on is called Local Control Cabinet testing area.
Furthermore, the project includes the design of the prototype that would grant the whole automation’s process of the Local Control Cabinet test. Nowadays, there is a huge amount of available possibilities in the market. After an exhaustive study of alternatives, the proper components have been chosen for the prototype.
The final result is the combination and assembly of all the prototype components, whose functionality has been checked as the last step of the project. It is important to bear in mind that it is only a functional prototype that allows undertaking a previously selected set of tests.
Two main conclusions might be extracted from the automation proposed in this project. On the one hand, checking time is reduced for each test. On the other hand, the workers can develop other tasks while the prototype is working automatically on the checks. Both facts involve a decrease of process time which leads to higher benefits or lower costs. |