SMART MANUFACTURING


Other entities are also working on democratizing smart manufacturing. The National Science Foundation is pitching in with


research, through its Industry/University Cooperative Re- search Center on Intelligent Maintenance Systems, led by mechanical and materials engineering professor Jay Lee, at the University of Cincinnati. And the Smart Manufactur- ing Leadership Coalition, chaired by Jim Wetzel at General Mills (Minneapolis, MN), was formed to make data-driven manufacturing attainable for all US industries through a cloud-based, open-architecture platform.


Manufacturing Workers 4.0 In the factory of the future, workers like Chaplin’s


wrench-wielding Tramp in Modern Times are obsolete. Who will replace them? “What we are looking for, really, on the engineering side is people with skills that go beyond the typical manufac- turing side [to include programming],” GE’s Biller said. “It’s at the intersection of disciplines where we really see the innovation is happening right now.”


Glossary S


mart manufacturing – Smart manufacturing is integrating network-based data and infor-


mation that comprises the real-time understanding, reasoning, planning and management of all aspects of a manufacturing and supply chain enterprise. SM is facilitated through use of advanced sensor-based data analytics, modeling and simulation in real-time. (Source: Smart Manufac- turing Leadership Coalition)


Internet of Things – “Today com-


puters—and, therefore, the Inter- net—are almost wholly dependent on human beings for information. If we had computers that knew everything there was to know about things—us- ing data they gathered without any help from us—we would be able to track and count everything, and greatly reduce waste, loss and cost. We would know when things needed replacing, repairing or recalling, and whether they were fresh or past their best.” (Source: Kevin Ashton, cred- ited with coining the phrase in 1999)


18


Bob Doyle, communications director of the Associa-


tion for Advancing Automation (Ann Arbor, MI), and an engineer who previously worked in manufacturing said, “It’s definitely not your father’s or your grandfather’s factory anymore. These new manufacturing facilities are very high tech and they require a different type of mindset.” Doyle said future workers will be trained through tech- nical education starting in high school, or earlier. Also, they may have participated in FIRST or VEX robotics extracur- ricular programs. “I think that in high school there’s potential to get some


experience in an internship and then move on to a commu- nity college advanced manufacturing program, and there are many of them now,” he said. One Midwest training school, RAMTEC Ohio (Marion, OH), has partnered with Honda, FANUC, Lincoln Welding and oth- ers to match the skills it teaches to real-world jobs. RAMTEC offers manufacturing training from high school through adult. “This generation is never going to sit idle because


Industrial Internet – the conver-


gence of machines and intelligent data. The Industrial Internet will transform industry through intel- ligent, interconnected objects that dramatically improve performance, lower operating costs and increase reliability (Source: Industrial Internet Consortium).


Brilliant Factory – A new breed of a manufacturing plant in which a single digital thread links design, engineering, production, supply chain and distribution of a prod- uct. (Source: a report co-written by Stephan Biller, chief manufacturing scientist at GE)


Digital Tapestry – At Lockheed Martin, an effort that includes end- to-end digital practices for a prod- uct’s lifecycle; collaborative develop- ment in a virtual reality environment; and 3D printing for production.


training will never stop,” predicts Ritch Ramey, RAMTEC coordinator. “The workers are going to have to under- stand programming; how do you make something repeat its mo- tion and think, whether it’s CNC programming or robotic or PLC programming.” Ramey’s colleague, Mark Edington,


a certified robotics instructor, said with computer programming touch- ing CNC, robotics, welding, hydrau- lics, and more, workers have to know and understand how computing ties everything together. Edington also points out the dif-


ference between the factory worker of yesteryear and the manufacturing employee of the future. “In years past, labor would have


its own niche, but now in the 21st century, a technician has to be a multitask person,” Edington said. “They have to know a bit about everything; hydraulics, pneumatics, PLCs, robotics, trouble-shooting, welding, electrical, machining.” Advanced Manufacturing Media


Editor in Chief Sarah A. Webster contributed to this report.


Spring 2016


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