Generation of manufacturing process model entities

The application of advanced geometric and technical models of mechanical products to the planning of manufacturing processes and CNC programs is one of the most widely investigated topics. Utilization of the flexibility of a flexible manufacturing system for fulfilling customer demands is impossible without flexible planning of manufacturing processes. This paper presents an approach to generic modeling of manufacturing processes and a method for creating Petri net representations of manufacturing process model entities. Manufacturing task features and process variants are taken into account. The Petri net process model is evaluated in the course of process planning and production scheduling. Process models are created on the basis of a form feature oriented part model and a workshop environment model. Petri net objects are created using knowledge on manufacturing process objects and process structure. The paper is organized as follows. First, the aims of the research are outlined and the characteristics of manufacturing process models of this type are summarized. Next, the principle of modeling, the structure of the process model and the process model entities are detailed. Following this, the generation procedure of the process model is presented. Finally, typical examples of manufacturing process model entities for a prismatic part machined in a flexible manufacturing system are shown.