The use of a Mechatronic Systems Simulator in Engineering Courses

This Innovative Practice Work in Progress presents the proposal and the development of a simulator for an Evolvable Production System that aims to represent a complete mechatronic system, simulate its operation, and support the learning of associated subjects. A mechatronic system is composed of mechanical and electronic modules that in turn may be associated with a software layer that is responsible for the intelligence of the entire system. This intelligence comes through interactions among software agents belonging to the software layer. The mechatronic devices are described through Finite State Machines, whose transitions are triggered by mechatronic software agents. The output of the simulator is a list with the set of skill calls, the time in which such calls are made, the respective system's answer, and the set of communication messages exchanged among the agents' peers. By using this simulator in engineering classrooms, it is possible to construct several proposals of mechatronic systems, represent those systems as complete manufacturing processes, and use intelligent software agents to simulate the complete functionality of the designed system. Afterward, with the results obtained from the simulation, students are prepared to implement real systems. The proposed simulator has been used in engineering courses at the Federal University of Amazonas, and the goal of this paper is describing the characteristics of the simulator and the results of its use in engineering disciplines.