ABSTRACT
Over the years, NBS/NIST has built various experimental facilities to support its assigned functions of custody, maintenance, and development of national measurement standards, and provision of the means and methods for making measurements consistent with those standards. Such facilities include a nuclear reactor, a cold neutron source, a linear accelerator, a fire research facility, and dead weight force generators. It was in this tradition that the Automated Manufacturing Research Facility (AMRF) was established. The AMRF was designed to anticipate the measurement and standards needs of the discrete parts manufacturing industry in the 1990s and beyond. The concept of in-process measurement and computer based error compensation also provided the conceptual foundation for the AMRF approach to measurement technology. AMRF consisted of six workstations integrated into a group technology cell. The workstations include horizontal machining workstation, vertical machining workstation, turning workstation, inspection workstation, cleaning and deburring workstation, and material handling workstation.
