Monitoring System with a Vision Smart Sensor

Current changes in the manufacturing techniques, referred to as Industry 4.0, require developing them as cyber-physical systems. And such a cyber physical approach has been used in the elaboration of the vision smart sensor (VSS) applied for the evaluation of machined surface during the cutting process. The VSS was built of several functional elements. The functional integration is based on the 5C architecture – Connection, Conversion, Cyber, Cognition and Configuration Levels. The starting point of the vision smart sensor is the machine vision system. Its components and connections with other levels are presented in a functional setup in the Smart Connection Level. The whole data processing and estimation of image features are described in the Data-to-information Conversion Level and the Cyber Level. The whole architecture of the cyber physical production system is preceded by discussion on elements within the Cognition Level. The vision smart sensor consists of spatially integrated components. The core of the sensor is the data processing unit, based on a PC architecture, to control the data processing, storing the data and communication. Image acquisition control and other auxiliary devices are controlled with this software. The paper concludes with the current research challenges required to expand the application of a cyber physical approach in the vision smart sensor design to machined surface monitoring. As an example, the vision smart sensor was implemented for the surface roughness estimation while cutting hardened steel with PCBN tools.