Simulation of the behavior of pneumatic drives for virtual commissioning of automated assembly systems

Nowadays the development of complex automated assembly systems is almost impossible without the support of computer aided simulation methods. In order to increase the reliability of such simulations, the simulation models must depict the realistic, physically correct behavior of the assembly system. Thus, including the physical properties of the elements in the models allows for an increase in realism of the simulation. One of the challenging aspects in this field is the physical behavior of pneumatic drives. For simulating the correct pneumatic behavior in the validation procedure virtual commissioning, the simulation model must further meet real-time requirements. In this contribution a simulation model for the pneumatic behavior that can be used in virtual commissioning is presented. Physics based simulation capabilities based on game engine technology are applied, complemented by physics based modeling using thermodynamic laws. Additionally, the simulation model is quantitatively validated in terms of accuracy with respect to kinematics, dynamics, and compressed air consumption. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.