Objective The main development areas are listed below: - Development of an intelligent in-process quality assurance system for the finished products - Design and development of a complete in-process monitoring system for feed-back control for all critical stages in the manufacturing process Development of new mechanical handling and transport equipment responsive to automatic, in-process monitoring and quality control - Computer Aided Design (CAD) link to tile decoration and final QA The quality assurance (QA) system is a hybrid vision system for surface characterisation of ceramic tiles. Major developments were in the areas of: - Vision algorithms and expert analysis of product quality characteristics - Hardware with minimum data bandwidth of 3.5 GB per second - Optical instruments for 3D surface fault detection and surface planarityThe proposal describes the design, development, and pilot implementation of an integrated and fully automatic process and product quality control manufacturing system for the traditional ceramic tile industry, to achieve minimal and totally recycleable waste. The systems exploit recent advances in sensor technology, fast parallel computer architectures and optimal quality control techniques accomplished by integrating CAD data directly to adaptive hybrid vision-based sensors and to process controls. These will be integrated in existing production environments to improve productivity, product quality and process control and reduce waste.The system will provide parameter control at full production rate, detecting faults at the critical production stages. Classification of defects will be by level of severity and by type. Acceptability will be user-defined. The system will be able to classify the products according to learned parameters. Quality assurance and process control is currently labour intensive. In view of the demographic changes, in less than 5 years manufacturers will able faced with an acute shortage of appropriate work force. Intelligent autmation will provide a viable alternative.A pilot system will be designed and installed within the end-user industry, to be evaluated for rapid prototyping and economic production for small batches of a very large number of products variants. Fields of science engineering and technologymechanical engineeringmanufacturing engineeringsocial scienceseconomics and businesseconomicsproduction economicsproductivityengineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringsensorsengineering and technologymaterials engineeringceramics Programme(s) FP3-BRITE/EURAM 2 - Specific programme (EEC) of research and technological development in the field of industrial and materials technologies, 1990-1994 Topic(s) 2.2.1 - Tools, techniques and systems for high quality manufacturing Call for proposal Data not available Funding Scheme CSC - Cost-sharing contracts Coordinator AXIOM BILDVERARBEITUNGSYSTEME GMBH EU contribution No data Address EUROPA CENTER 130G 10789 BERLIN Germany See on map Total cost No data Participants (4) Sort alphabetically Sort by EU Contribution Expand all Collapse all H and R Johnson Tiles Ltd United Kingdom EU contribution No data Address Highgate Tile Works Tunstall ST6 4JX Stoke-on-Trent See on map Total cost No data IMPERIAL COLLEGE OF SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND MEDICINE United Kingdom EU contribution No data Address Exhibition Road SW7 2BX LONDON See on map Links Website Opens in new window Total cost No data Nuova Fima SpA Italy EU contribution No data Address Via dell'Artigiano 33-35 41040 Spezzano di Fiorano See on map Total cost No data University of Cambridge United Kingdom EU contribution No data Address New Museums Site Pembroke Street CB2 3QG Cambridge See on map Total cost No data
