Title: PLC-based implementation of supervisory control for flexible manufacturing systems using theory of regions

Authors: Sadok Rezig; Chekib Ghorbel; Zied Achour; Nidhal Rezg

Addresses: Laboratoire de Génie Informatique de Production et de Maintenance (LGIPM), Université de Lorraine, Metz, France ' Advanced System Laboratory, Polytechnic School of Tunisia, BP 743, 2078, La Marsa, Tunisia ' Laboratoire de Génie Informatique de Production et de Maintenance (LGIPM), Université de Lorraine, Metz, France ' Laboratoire de Génie Informatique de Production et de Maintenance (LGIPM), Université de Lorraine, Metz, France

Abstract: The supervisory control is a common theory for the synthesis of Petri net (PN) supervisors for discrete event systems given a PN model and a control specification for the maximum permissive behaviour. The theory of regions as one of control synthesis method generates a PN controller to satisfy the control specification. Though the theory of regions has for over a decade received a considerable attention in academy, still very few applications exist. The real cause of this seems to be a contradiction between the abstract controller and its physical implementation. This is evident in particular when the implementation is supposed to be based on a programmable logic controller (PLC), as is the case for flexible manufacturing systems. Indeed, since the synchronous PLC is based on signals, the PN supervisor remains asynchronous; this explains its implementation difficulty. In this work, a control synthesis method using the theory of regions is implemented with a Java application on PLCs of a flexible manufacturing system (FMS) installed in our research laboratory in the University of Lorraine in Metz, France.

Keywords: Petri nets; signal interpreted Petri net; theory of regions; program logic controller; supervisory control; Petri net controller; reachability graph; algebraic methods; flexible manufacturing systems; FMSs; deadlock prevention.

DOI: 10.1504/IJAAC.2019.101911

International Journal of Automation and Control, 2019 Vol.13 No.5, pp.619 - 640

Received: 30 Mar 2017
Accepted: 07 Mar 2018
Published online: 30 Aug 2019 *

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