Matching Algorithm for Automated Resource Selection within Assembly Line Design

Despite all the technological progress and digitalization of manufacturing processes, assembly lines and their design are still far from the ideas of the fourth industrial revolution. The assembly planning process has high complexity and is still done manually or only partially automated. One of the biggest challenges is resource selection to automatically identify all the machines that can perform the required assembly process. Based on previous works, this paper presents a matching algorithm for an automated resource selection within a fully automated assembly design platform. This platform uses a set of graph-based models at its core: an assembly feature model for product structure representation, a standardized skill model, and a highly abstract process model. The resulting matching algorithm uses concepts of graph isomorphism and homomorphism for graph analysis to universally identify matches between skill definitions and processes.