Prior to 2016, Augmented Reality (AR) in manufacturing was merely a pipe dream. Now, the potential for Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality in many industries is recognised, including the manufacturing industry. AR is already revolutionising the industrial manufacturing plant floor.
AR aims to produce efficient operations by reducing production downtime, quickly identifying problems, and maintaining all services and processes, but AR has many benefits for the manufacturing industry.
6 Ways Augmented Reality Is Revolutionising The Manufacturing Industry!
1. PROBLEM SOLVING
When faced with problems, assigning the correct person to the job has always been essential. The worker sent to fix the issue must be adequately trained in the required area. This can be resolved easily if you understand the exact issue in advance, but what if the worker faces multiple issues when they arrive on site to fix the problem?
With Augmented Reality, workers can contact more experienced workers to resolve issues, allowing them to directly show all the problems to the maintenance team and engineers with visual aid in real time, meaning they can diagnose and resolve issues faster.
2. WORK FASTER
Usually, it can take years for engineers to train for working on complex machinery. With the aid of AR glasses using depth sensors, cameras, and motion sensors, that are overlaying images, videos and other relevant information into the real-world during work, engineers can view processes and instructions hands-free as they assemble specific components.
With this method, accuracy of engineers can increase to 96%, with 30% increase in productivity.
3. EASILY ACCESS DATA
Engineers and manufacturers can walk up to an asset while wearing AR glasses and asset-specific information will be displayed. The AR-enabled glasses will scan a QR code associated with the asset and can display required information such as live video feeds, real-time data, repair instructions, etc.
4. REDUCE PRODUCTION DOWNTIME
Manufacturing firms can face production downtime due to machinery malfunctions which can cost organisations hundreds of thousands of euros. With the help of AR, the team can quickly identify the problem and prevent the downtime from ever occurring. Using AR headsets or glasses, the team can visually identify the problem and resolve it there and then, availing of assistance if needed.
5. PREVENT ERRORS
Airbus has been using augmented reality in manufacturing for several purposes under the brand Smart Augmented Reality Tool (SART). A good example of this is for the inspection of bracket installation in fuselage assembly when a tablet camera superimposes a virtual image of the as-designed assembly over the real as-built product. The technology quickly enables engineers to detect any flaws.
6. TRAINING
Both AR and VR have demonstrated great potential when it comes to up-skilling and training. Within manufacturing industries, operators can be trained using AR before using their skills on real assets. This can ensure workers are adequately trained before working with dangerous, complex machinery. AR training can increase knowledge retention and decrease training times by providing a more-immersive training experience to workers.
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