Design and implementation of a distributed real-time expert-system for fault diagnosis in modular manufacturing systems

Abstract This paper reports on design and implementation of a hierarchical real-time expert-system architecture directed to real-time diagnosis of modern production systems. Diagnosis is model based by using timed Petri-net models as well as continuous system models. The logical and physical structures of the corresponding distributed system are discussed in some detail. As a hardware basis a multi-Transputer system with optical links is used, operated by the distributed operating system Helios which is extended by real-time servers. A prototype of the distributed system has been built and applied to a commercial Modular Production System. First results about the system behaviour are shown by means of a graphical user interface based on X Window/Motif.