SBIR-STTR Award

First Marine International, in their latest benchmarking study of the global shipbuilding industry, identified production preparation as one of the key items preventing U.S. shipbuilders from reaching world quality status. These problems are partially caused by a lack of standardized tools to support and automate production planning operations. Simulation tools offer a powerful method to analyze production capabilities, resources, and provide feedback to planners on optimizing assembly planning and sequencing. However, use of simulations is limited due to the long set-up times and steep learning curve. The team will investigate the possibility of automating the creation of a simulation model from an existing assemply planning program. Standardized resource models which describe shipyard facilities, along with the assembly structures definitions extracted from product model data will be used as inputs into a discrete event simulator. The resource model will be rules driven, modular and customizable, enabling work packages to be created at one site and rapidly modified to reflect the work environment at another site. The platforms used will be open and interoperable in order to encourage industry collaboration.

Keywords:
Automated Assembly Planning, Shipyard Assembly Planning, Scheduling, Event Sequencing, Simulation, Production Planning

Discrete Event Simulation (DES) can help U.S. shipyards reduce cost and schedule risks. A major barrier to employing DES in shipyards is the overwhelming task of modeling production facilities and work content. Another obstacle is large data volumes generated for shipbuilding can seriously degrade system performance. The goals of this project are to reduce manual data input for simulation by at least 70% and to achieve acceptable levels of system performance. Utilizing two Atlantec tools, QA Desktop and Assembly Production, an automated front end application for DES modeling systems will be developed that greatly reduces modeling time and processes large volumes of complex data. The application will be a rules-based facility, resource, and process modeling system that interfaces with major DES systems. The initial approach will be to develop a system for yard-wide capacity planning, scheduling, and estimating. Follow on efforts will enable detailed planning and scheduling, connecting CAD, MRP, and scheduling systems.

Keywords:
Automated Assembly Planning, Automated Production Simulation, Assembly Library, Rules Based Facility Modeling.