VWS4LS

Information models for the product description

SP1 "Concept, information models and product description" focused on defining a standardized approach for the description of Wire Harness with the aim of enabling efficient and collaborative data exchange between the various players in the production chain. The standardization and unification of product modelling should ensure that all companies involved in wire harness production have access to a database and can work together seamlessly. This should also enable the optimization of development processes and an improvement in the quality of the end product.

Figure [ Wire Harness design drawing]

To this end, the requirements for typical production processes in the wire harness industry recorded in SP3 were systematically analysed and, based on this, the product-process-resource (PPR) model was used to systematically create data models for the sufficiently accurate mapping of production processes.

Existing standards such as KBL, VEC, ECLASS and OPC UA were then checked for applicability and suitability against this identified requirements basis.

After this careful analysis of the circumstances, the fundamental decisions were made for the overall project to still support KBL (as a historically established format) for wire harness development in addition to VEC and to provide OPC UA as the standard for dynamic production control. ECLASS references should be used wherever possible to ensure semantic unambiguity.

For the wire harness modeling for the transfer to the production phase, the necessary information was derived from the KBL and VEC standards and an information model for the "Bill of Material" (BOM) of the wire harness was created, whereby KBL and VEC are attached or linked to the VWS as file elements. Furthermore, various improvements were introduced in VEC Rel. 2.10 to close identified gaps in the data model.

The necessary reduction of the "150%" engineering model of a wire harness to the "100%" production model of the individual Wire Harness to be produced was also analyzed.

Another key outcome of SP1 was the decision to work with the VDMA to develop the OPC UA Companion Specification "OPC 40570: OPC UA for the Wire Harness Manufacturing Industry" in order to create a uniform standard for communication and interaction between different systems in the wire harness industry.