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A new type haptics-based virtual environment system for assembly training of complex products

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Abstract

Virtual reality (VR)-based assembly training has been an interesting topic for the last decades. Generally, there are two shortcomings for nowadays virtual assembly training systems. One is that the operators cannot move around the virtual environment in a natural way as people activity in the real world: they are constrained in a fixed position or can only move in a limited space. The other is that most of the virtual assembly training systems are based on geometry constraint modeling only, which lacks haptics feedback. A new type haptics-based virtual environment system for assembly training of complex products is described in this paper. A new low-cost motion simulator is designed and integrated with the virtual environment to realize free walking by human. An automatic data integration interface is developed to transfer geometry, topology, assembly, and physics information from a computer-aided design system to a VR application, and a hierarchical constraint-based data model is rebuilt to construct the virtual assembly environment. Physics-based modeling and haptics feedback are undertaken to simulate the realistic assembly operations. The application examples and evaluation experiments demonstrate that both motion simulator and haptics have great value for training of assembly processes.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. IDMEC-Polo FEUP, Faculty of Engineering, Porto University, Porto, Portugal

    PingJun Xia, António M. Lopes & Maria Teresa Restivo

  2. School of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, China

    YingXue Yao

Authors
  1. PingJun Xia
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  2. António M. Lopes
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  3. Maria Teresa Restivo
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  4. YingXue Yao
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to PingJun Xia.

Additional information

Dr. Pingjun Xia is a research fellow at UISPA, IDMEC-Polo FEUP in Portugal. His research interests include virtual reality and haptics in industrial and medical environments.

The main contribution

There are two shortcomings for nowadays virtual assembly training systems. One is that the operators cannot move around the virtual environment in a natural way as people in real world, they are constrained in a fixed position or can only move in a limited space. The other is that most of the virtual assembly training systems are based on geometry constraint modeling only, which lack haptics feedback. This paper aims at solving these two problems.

The novel

The novel of this paper is mainly in experimental techniques. A new type haptics-based virtual environment system for assembly training of complex products is described to overcome the previous two shortcomings. A new low-cost motion simulator is designed and integrated with the virtual environment to realize free walking by human. An automatic data integration interface is developed to transfer geometry, topology, assembly, and physics information from a computer-aided design system to virtual reality application, and a hierarchical constraint-based data model is rebuilt to construct the virtual assembly environment. Physics-based modeling and haptics feedback are undertaken to simulate the realistic assembly operations.

Industrial applications

This system can be used for assembly and maintenance planning and training of complex products. The product designers and assembly engineers can use this system to plan assembly sequence and path, simulate assembly or disassembly operation, and get the realistic operation skills for actual production.

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Xia, P., Lopes, A.M., Restivo, M.T. et al. A new type haptics-based virtual environment system for assembly training of complex products. Int J Adv Manuf Technol 58, 379–396 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00170-011-3381-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00170-011-3381-8

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