PLM applications

Automatic Path Planning responds to the demand for much more efficient tools for virtually validating the mounting or dismounting of parts. Its goal is to offer an easier, faster and more reliable way that will advantageously complement a manual or interactive method.

Here are the main benefits of "Automatic Path Planning" applied to PLM applications:

Anticipate complex issues in assembly maintainability at early planning stages
Detect accessibility design errors without any specific hardware interface
Allow non-specialized people to find a collision free path even into a cluttered digital mock-up
Validate a design update in a mouse-click by re-using a former result
Multiply the number of trials as the software does the search for you
Visualize several computed paths and select your best choice

Therefore, integrating a powerful "Automatic Path Planning" tool in your PLM Methods and Processes will significantly improve the engineering design, service costs and time to market.

In Product Engineering Design, Automatic Path Planning is mainly used for assembly, maintainability or accessibility studies.

With an interactive tool even an experienced operator spends several hours to solve a regular path planning scenario. You deserve new tools like Kineo Path Planner^TM to take full advantage of digital mock-ups and to solve and document the mounting or dismounting of parts in minutes:

"with tools used for studying mounting and dismounting of equipments located inside the reactor masts of the Airbus A340, it took us 2 hours to determine the optimal trajectory against 2 to 5 minutes with KineoWorks™… for flap systems, KineoWorks™ found the solution in 35 seconds, when it took us 2 hours!" [Read more] about AIRBUS article.

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Maintainability : with Kineo Path Planner^TM , accessibility for maintenance constraints can be integrated from the design phase. In this example an experienced operator in moving 3D bodies in cluttered digital mock-ups needs 5 days to prove that the seat can be removed from the car.

Kineo Path Planner^TM solves the problem within 5 minutes

model courtesy of Automobiles RENAULT

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Assembly : Kineo Path Planner^TM will show you if a set of mechanical parts can be assembled together. In this example the design of the displayed windshield wiper system has been rejected because the design team did not succeed in proving assembly feasibility.

Kineo Path Planner^TM proved it in 20 seconds

Furthermore, the path result can be saved and re-used in case of design modification for a one-click assembly check.

model courtesy of Automobiles RENAULT

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Serviceability : With Kineo Path Planner^TM you are quickly able to see where a design proposal prevented component removal in Service. Being able to communicate precise change information to Engineering led directly to a design modification and issue resolution. Kineo Path Planner^TM proved it in 52 seconds.
The ability to document the results(snapshots, movies) with high quality rendered images for effective communication purposes is the final challenge of a successful Serviceability Study.

model courtesy of FORD

In Manufacturing Engineering, the use of Automatic Path Planning leads to a significantly reduced time-to-market and time-to-volume thanks to much more powerful assembly feasibility studies and manufacturability studies.

Assembly feasibility studies for ME simulations: at this stage, it is critical to validate and document the assembly feasibility of the proposed virtual product design together with the automated manufacturing process. You can here apply Kineo Path Planner^TM with specific motion constraints so as to simulate simultaneously both geometric and kinematical constraints.
NC machine and offline robot programming: automatic off-line robot programming can crash when dealing with highly constrained environments. Users have to generate robot paths manually and consequently waste a lot of time. KineoWorks^TM will automatically generate collision-free paths for the robot, thus increasing productivity and quality.

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In this benchmark the programmer of the spot welding robot tries to find a path avoiding the clamping tools in a highly cluttered environment. The unique solution requires the robot to reconfigure itself. Such a problem is out of the scope of existing automated solutions.

KineoWorks^TM solves this problem in a few seconds.

model courtesy of UGS Tecnomatix®

In Process Engineering, Automatic Path Planning significantly upgrades the maintenance operations planning.

In your industrial facilities, you have to plan maintenance operations using highly articulated robots, cranes, rolling bridges, carts and other maintenance equipments.

KineoWorks^TM brings the qualitative responses for every step of Computer Aided Engineering, from design through in-service operation to decommissioning.

Is a planned operation feasible? How can the operation be carried out? Which mechanical device should be used and what is the best way to use it? How can I compare alternative solutions? What is the cost of this operation? All these questions are addressed by KineoWorks^TM.

Kineo Path Planner^TM is particularly suitable to evaluate the feasibility of operations with specific and highly articulated robots inside highly constrained 3D environments such as nuclear power plants, nuclear propellers…

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Is the turbo-pump movable within the cluttered environment of this nuclear power plant? Is the task feasible by using a 3 DOF rolling bridge respecting special kinematics constraints? Solving the problem "by hand" in the digital mock-up is a time consuming task.

KineoWorks^TM solves the problem in just a few seconds, saving days of tedious operator work

model courtesy of EDF