Implementation of a Bi-Directional Digital Twin for Industry 4 Labs in Academia: A Solution Based on OPC UA

Abstract

With the increased demands of smarter manufacturing approaches around the world, the process of industrial digital transformation is being pushed in and by both industry and academia. Learning factories and testing laboratories have been developed for decades for teaching and training purposes in Academia. Nowadays, as the future trend in industry, Industry 4 is being merged into the latest development of learning factories and testing laboratories. This paper presents the development and implementation of a bi-directional digital twin application in an Industry 4 testing laboratory at University of South Australia. The solution is based on the establishment of OPC UA connection between two cobots of different brands, the use of NX Siemens as a CAD simulation platform and a SCADA system from Inductive Automation. Due to differences between system interfaces, communication between different modules was challenging. Python OPC UA servers were developed. The digital twin replicates the physical system and is driven by inputs from the assembly cell.