AUTOMATED MANUFACTURING SYSTEMS, MODELLED BY MEANS OF COLOURED PETRI NETS WITH COMPLEX COLOURS AND FUNCTIONS

The automated manufacturing systems are frequent within the modern manufacturing systems. This paper shows how the coloured Petri nets are used to assess a robotic manufacturing system, considering several versions of it. The system is made of three machines, and the workpieces are moved through the system by means of a conveyer-type transferring device. Three typed of workpieces are manufactured in this system. the modelling and simulation are made by means of coloured Petri nets. Within the first version, each workpiece type is manufactured on one machine. The loading and evacuation of the workpieces is made by means of an industrial robot for each machine. Within another version, a gantry-type robot serves all the three machines. Also, this paper analyses the case when the manufacturing of one workpiece is made on two machines. These versions were modelled by means of complex coloured Petri nets. The simulations were meant to point out any bottlenecks that may occur within the operation of the system. Using the time factor allowed to assess the system versions also for efficiency. Finally, the paper confirms that modelling and simulation with coloured Petri nets are very useful to assess the performances of the robot manufacturing systems.