New technique for the interpretation of ISO 14649 and 6983 based on open CNC technology

Abstract

Computer numerical control (CNC) controller is the termination organiser, which is located at the end of the manufacturing process chain. The CNC controller is composed of two modules: software and hardware. The software module of the controller is known as interpreter that translates International Standards Organization (ISO) data interface model instructions to the hardware parts of the controller in the required structure of the machine. The aim of next-generation CNC is to be portable, interoperable, flexible, open, intelligent and adoptable. In the progression towards the development of next-generation CNC systems, the problems of current ISO data interface model limitation and CNC machine vendor dependency were faced. In order to overcome these issues, the ISO standard (ISO 14649) and open architecture control (OAC) technology were introduced. In this paper, a new technique for the interpretation of both ISO data interface models has been presented. The developed module is specially designed for the OAC-based CNC systems that translate the ISO 14649-21 and ISO 6983 information to the CNC machine in required structure. The module also provides a shop floor editing facility and is also able to generate the physical file output in user-defined structure of .txt and .xml formats.

Keywords:

• CNC
• STEP-NC
• interpreter
• CAD/CAM
• open architecture control
• LabVIEW

Acknowledgement

The authors thank Dr. David Loffredo, Vice President of STEP Tools Inc., and Dr. Nazareno de Oliveira Pacheco from the Universidade Federal Santa Catarina for their help and guidance.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Malaysian Government under Science fund S021 (MOSTI) and Malaysian International Scholarship (MIS) under the Ministry of Education (MOE) Malaysia.