SBIR Phase I: High-Throughput Agile Robotic Manufacturing System for Tile Mosaics

这个小企业创新研究（SBIR）第一阶段项目将展示一个高吞吐量敏捷瓷砖马赛克制造系统的概念验证原型。马赛克已经被证明是视觉辉煌的伟大来源数千年。尽管马赛克在艺术和建筑上很突出，但手工设计和组装马赛克是很困难的。第一阶段工作的目标是证明可编程的高吞吐量多头机器人瓷砖装配系统的可行性，以提高马赛克瓷砖的生产灵活性。第一阶段的研究创新将把平行瓷砖放置的好处与坚固的高容量瓷砖盒结合起来，从根本上减少瓷砖马赛克的制造时间和相关的瓷砖马赛克组装成本。第一阶段的可衡量目标是生产能力比目前最先进的马赛克制造技术提高5倍，同时提高瓷砖放置精度。该系统将能够产生模板和？大规模定制？马赛克在第二阶段，原型将被细化为一个商业级系统，与企业资源规划系统集成，并投入服务在阿尔泰？的生产环境。成功的第一/第二阶段示范将大大降低制造马赛克的时间和成本，并可能彻底改变价值760亿美元的全球瓷砖行业。该项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力超越了艺术，设计和建筑。机器人自动化将降低马赛克的成本，并增加其在装饰公共，商业和住宅空间方面的社会影响。如果研究成功，将对敏捷制造产生重大影响。它将通过降低高通量柔性组装的成本来渗透到不可预见的市场。该研究提出的解决方案将立即适用于客户和合作伙伴，并可能适用于医疗，制药，食品，消费品等平行行业，这些行业将受益于机器人敏捷制造支持的大规模定制。敏捷的马赛克制造能力可以振兴美国瓷砖制造业并创造就业机会。调查人员估计，5倍的生产率提高将使价格突破19.99美元，比竞争对手低75%，并首次实现广泛的市场可承受性。

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project will demonstrate a proof-of-conceptprototype of a high-throughput agile tile mosaic manufacturing system. Mosaics have proven to be agreat source of visual splendor for thousands of years. Despite its prominence in art and architecture,mosaic is arduous to design and assemble by hand. The goal of this Phase I work is to prove thefeasibility of a programmable high-throughput multi-head robotic tile assembly system to enhance theproduction agility of mosaic tilings. Research innovation in Phase I will merge the benefits of paralleltile placement with robust high-capacity tile cartridges to radically decrease tile mosaic fabrication timeand associated tile mosaic assembly costs. The measurable objective of Phase I is a 5x increase inproduction throughput over current state-of-the-art mosaic manufacturing technology, while enhancingtile placement accuracy. The system will be capable of producing both template and ?mass customized?mosaics. In Phase II, the prototype will be refined into a commercial grade system, integrated with anEnterprise Resource Planning system, and placed into service in Artaic?s production environment.Successful Phase I/II demonstration will significantly lower the time and cost for manufacturing mosaicsand potentially revolutionize the $76B global tile industry.The broader impact/commercial potential of this project goes beyond art, design, and architecture.Robotic automation will lower the cost of mosaic and increase its societal impact in adorning public,commercial, and residential spaces. The proposed research, if successful, will have a significant impacton agile manufacturing. It will allow penetration into unforeseen markets by reducing the cost of highthroughput flexible assembly. The solution proposed by the research will be immediately applicable tocustomers and partners, and potentially useful in parallel industries such as medical, pharmaceutical, food, consumer products, and others that will benefit from robotic agile manufacturing enabled mass customization. Agile mosaic manufacturing capability could revitalize the U.S. tile manufacturing industry and create job opportunities. The investigators estimate that a 5x production rate increase will enable a breakthrough price of $19.99, 75% lower than the competition, and for the first time achieve broad market affordability.