Research Initiation: Discrete-Event Control Design Methods for Flexible Automation

9410386 Zhou Sequential Function Chart (SFC) and Petri net based methodologies are addressed in this project. The first objective of this project is to perform a benchmark study for Ladder Logic Diagrams (LLDs), SFCs, and Petri nets in terms of their design efficiency, cost, adaptability, and maintainability on a flexible manufacturing system. The second objective is to perform design recovery from LLDs to SFCs and Petri nets. The research results will advance the knowledge, tools, and methodologies for designing and optimizing discrete-event controllers in large industrial automation projects. Current industrial automated manufacturing systems work with a number of inputs and outputs varying from perhaps ten to several thousands and have communication capacity. Traditional discrete-event control design approaches such as LLDs prove entirely ineffective on large-scale problems.