Collaborative coordination control (CCC) of distributed multimachine manufacturing

Coordination control of multi-machine workstations in distributed FMS and other manufacturing facilities has been designed with synchronous and asynchronous techniques. In a recent study at Purdue, the element of machine collaboration has been added to the coordination control, to add to the flexibility and reliability properties of the processes. The new Collaborative Coordination control strategy is explained and illustrated with two specific implementation case studies based on one U.S. and one French FMS facility. Impacts on performance measures are evaluated. Certain advantages, limitations and open questions of the approach are discussed.