TECH
The BreadCrumb – this small device is the answer to a big problem .
becomes useless because it doesn ’ t know where it ’ s going and what it ’ s doing next . The vehicle becomes ineffective and can ’ t follow its commands and what it ’ s trying to achieve .
“ It forgets what it ’ s doing and where it is and it doesn ’ t know how to rectify the situation , so the company has lost a vehicle . That can fundamentally impact the performance of production lines and throughput and has a significant impact on key performance indicators .
“ We know lots of logistics and automotive companies that have fundamental problems with connectivity around their plants and their sites .”
Until now , the only solution available has been to flood a designated area with wireless access points to cover all the dead spots . But that requires major financial investment , as well as expensive and messy installation work .
“ Those wireless access points all have to be wired back through a central network switch ,” explains Garry . “ The network switch is then wired back to the main infrastructure , so you ’ re looking at lots of fibre-optic and ethernet cabling and the process becomes very , very costly and that still doesn ’ t completely solve the problem .”
The answer is ingenious , neat and clean .
“ The solution is what ’ s called a BreadCrumb device , and the more BreadCrumbs you spread around your environment , the more reliability you get
from your system ,” says Garry .
“ A BreadCrumb is a wireless network node . We ’ ll put a BreadCrumb onto every automated vehicle and the more BreadCrumbs you put into a specific area , the better the system becomes .
“ The BreadCrumbs allow high throughput data and video , and every BreadCrumb knows the other BreadCrumbs are there . They recognise every BreadCrumb that is added to the system .
“ BreadCrumb will retain the best connection until the point when it knows there ’ s a stronger connection available and it will swap automatically . It ’ s basically a self-healing network .
“ It ’ s industrial-grade wireless and it works completely differently to anything else out there at the moment .”
The BreadCrumbs and the system they link to , Kinetic Mesh , have been developed by Rajant Corporation .
Applied Integration has been discussing a partnership over the past year and Garry is delighted that the result will enable the ambitious Teesside company to offer a game-changing solution to a problem that ’ s plagued the automated vehicle sector . The company can ’ t wait to roll it out to new customers .
“ We are proud and excited to be working with Rajant . The technology is unlike any other wireless mesh system we have seen in the market .
“ It ’ s fabulous kit . We have a test kit in our factory in Stokesley and what we can do now is go onto sites where people are having issues with connection problems and we can do an investigation and demonstrate the equipment in their environment .
“ Our customers are really interested in this and we are now going out to set up demonstrations . The kit ’ s available and where any company has connectivity issues , we have the solution .
“ We ’ re targeting Kinetic Mesh for locations that are reliant on critical information being communicated to and from AMRs . If a firm wants to get a set of car doors to lineside in 90 seconds to ensure they can maintain production and get the cars out on time , then that becomes a fundamental requirement in the process .”
These are exciting times to be at the forefront of technical innovation and Applied Integration is at the vanguard .
“ We ’ re largely focused on Industry 4.0 , which is the key buzzword in industry at the moment ,” says Garry . “ It ’ s about digitalisation and analytics and improving what we do on a day-to-day basis through the use of robotics , automated vehicles and automation technology .
“ It ’ s right across the board , there are no boundaries to where we can put our technology . Anywhere you want to automate a process , where you want to digitise something , if you want improved information , where you want to improve your key performance indicators , we can use our technology .”
For more information , visit appliedintegration . co . uk .
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