Virtual manufacturing work systems

Contemporary computer and information technologies enable digitalization and virtualization of real systems and their exploration in a virtual space. In the paper, a virtual CNC machine tool is presented. It is build up to support development of CNC controllers and control algorithms on the basis of the Hardware-in-the-Loop principle, where the object of control is substituted with a virtual one. The developed digital model of a machine tool may serve also as a model of a digital factory. In the case study the virtual model of a desktop CNC engraving machine LAKOS 150 is described. The model is integrated in the control loop with a real CNC controller via the CNC2VML interface, which converts the controller's signal into digital information and vice versa. This enables communications between the CNC controller and the virtual machine tool model in real-time. The model is visualized in a 3D graphical environment. The applied programming techniques are generic and based on the open architecture principle and standard graphic library.