Evaluation of operation load in automatic raw material inspection system

In POSCO, an ARAMIS (automatic raw material inspection system) is now working for the automatic inspection of moisture content and particle size distribution of the imported materials. In the design stage for ARAMIS, operation load and operability should be evaluated for various operating conditions, various system configurations and the processing capability of the elementary components. This work is essential prior to real implementation, because some overload can cause system malfunction such as system stoppage and decreasing processing speed, thus yielding system failure or unreliable measurement results. A series of simulation studies was performed with graphical animation software. From the results, the phenomena and the causes of operation are determined. In addition, this simulation is very useful to design the appropriate control logic for the whole system operation to obtain the optimum performance.