Bosch

Support its workers and to reduce the error rate

CHALLENGE

Robert Bosch España Fábrica Madrid S.A. is the mass-scale manufacturer for automotive sensors, which process is fully automated and is running 24/7 non-stop. However, the plant is also manufacturing Electronic Control Units, where small series of spare parts are supplied to car makers and aftermarket. Since the batches are small and it only requires a few hours in one month, even in some cases, in one year, hence it is neither possible

nor economically viable to automate the production line for those automotive spare parts. Although they are small in quantity, they are complex in reference designs that usually BOSCH need to produce more than 1500 different reference designs. Therefore, BOSCH have workstations target for such small-scale production in the shopfloor supervised by experienced workers. It’s not hard to understand such production is prone to errors.

USE CASE

BOSCH expects to support collaboration and monitor the process, speed up task allocation, exception handling, reduce labour effort (lifting and transferring products) and quality checking operations, thus changing this area into a truly collaborative workspace.

This will be achieved by redesigning and optimising production process, to take full advantage of several new technologies – end-to-end production monitoring and execution including:

collaborative robots capable of handling and reliably manipulating Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs) and boxes containing electronic components;

AGVs capable of transferring components and processed goods between the working cells without interrupting the workers’ tasks;

Augmented Reality to support non-expert workers in proper placement of the electronic components over the PCB;

Additional technologies like RFID or computer vision to facilitate tracking and quality assurance integration of this production process with the existing management software, including SAP used in the plant.

Collaborative robot picks up the PCB and transfers it to the working stations and/or to the testing stations. The human, assisted with an AR system which provides real-time instructions and records any action thus, improving quality and reducing errors, places the electronic components on the board, to be then transferred to the soldering station by the collaborative robot.

AR support for assembling PCBs

SHOP4CF scope:

Show instructions for the human worker with AR
Check that the components assembled are the correct ones
Check that the components were assembled on the correct position

Transfer of PCB trays between the lines & ‘supermarkets’

SHOP4CF scope:

Load trays on AGV
AGV transfer in collaborative space
Control of elevator
Tracking of PCB trays

IMPACT

The automated process model will ensure traceability and support timely allocation of tasks and shorter production cycles. The AGVs improves the overall productivity of the line and reduced workers burden of repetitive and arduous work.

In the first stage of piloting the new lines will be tested outside of the manufacturing line. Afterwards, the newly developed stations will be integrated within the existing manufacturing process.The main results will be demonstrated in core Bosch management level and employees

SHOP4CF

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CHALLENGE

USE CASE

IMPACT

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