DESIGN OF AN NGC/SPARC-BASED MACHINE TOOL CONTROLLER

THE PROPOSED PROJECT CONSISTS OF THE DESIGN OF ANEW MACHINE TOOL CONTROLLER THAT WILL MARRY NEXT GENERATION CONTROLLER (NGC) TECHNOLOGY WITH AN ADVANCED RISC HARDWARE PLATFORM. THE RESULTING MACHINE TOOL CONTROLLER'S COMPUTATIONAL POWER SHOULD BE MORE THAN TEN TIMES GREATER THAN THAT OF EXISTING CONTROLLERS, RESULTING IN HIGHER ACCURACY PATHS, BETTER SURFACE FINISH, AND FASTER CYCLE TIMES. THEUSE OF A SUN SPARCSTATION FRONT END WILL LEVERAGE OFF THE HIGH MARKETVOLUMES AND RAPID PERFORMANCE INCREASES BEING DRIVEN BY OTHER MARKETS. IT WILL ALSO PROVIDE CONNECTIVITY TO A VARIETY OF NETWORKING PRODUCTS, SIMPLIFYING FACTORY INTEGRATION. THE NEW SPOX REAL-TIME OPERATINGSYSTEM FOR THE DIGITAL SIGNAL PROCESSORS IN THE PROPOSED CONTROLLER WILL ENHANCE THE PORTABILITY AND SCALABILITY OF NGC APPLICATION SOFTWARE AND WILL ENABLE A LARGE QUANTITY OF SOFTWARE WRITTEN FOR OTHER APPLICATIONS TO BE USED ON THIS CONTROLLER. THE PROPOSED ARCHITECTURE WILLALSO USE NEW MOTION CONTROL TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPED FOR ROBOT CONTROLLERS THAT IMPLEMENTS ADVANCED FEATURES SUCH AS ADAPTIVE CONTROL AND MULTI-MACHINE COORDINATION. THE PROPOSED CONTROLLER WILL ALSO BE ABLE TO BE USED IN A WIDE VARIETY OF APPLICATIONS THAT EXTEND BEYOND MACHINE TOOLS, SUCH AS ROBOTIC CONTROL, GENERAL MOTION CONTROL, AND PROCESS CONTROL APPLICATIONS. ANTICIPATED BENEFITS/POTENTIAL COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS - THE COMPUTATIONAL POWER OF THE PROPOSED CONTROLLER ENABLES TRAJECTORY GENERATION AT THE SAME RATE AS CONTROL LAW EXECUTION, RESULTINGIN HIGHER ACCURACY PATHS, BETTER SURFACE FINISH AND FASTER CYCLE TIMES. THE CONTROLLER'S FLEXIBLE, EXPANDABLE, MODULAR, OPEN ARCHITECTURE ENABLE CONTINUAL MODULE IMPROVEMENTS TO BE DEVELOPED BY SMALL ENTREPRENEURIAL SOFTWARE COMPANIES (A UNIQUE U.S. STRENGTH).