ABSTRACT
This chapter presents guidelines for developing the automated quality assurance (AQA) plan, and discusses implementation guidelines for machine vision and robotic inspection. It also discusses the use of computer protocols to solve the communications problems between systems of different manufacturers. The chapter also presents generalized guidelines for assessing the costs and benefits of AQA. There are several aspects of an in-house robotics program: the feasibility study, organization and planning, the first robot installation, safety, and public relations. The single greatest problem in the development of full-scale computerized manufacturing or process systems is that computer systems by different manufacturers seldom can communicate with each other. The local area network permits the user to distribute processing functions across several processors to increase performance, expandability, and reliability. Real-world industrial robots have a motion which is uniquely determined by their geometry or joint configuration. Vision systems purchased for stand-alone inspection applications generally have good paybacks.
