Dynamic and Visual Assembly Instruction for Configurable Products Using Augmented Reality Techniques

In this research, an augmented reality based system is suggested to enhance assembly tasks. In this system, a worker can see the additional graphical information superimposed on the real world scenes. Graphical instructions and virtual objects are used for advising the worker with the assembly tasks. Assembly is the capstone process in manufacturing. Generally, assembly has been performed by people, and their smartness and flexibility have compensated possible deficiencies in assembly process design.

The system is emulated with a simplified assembly task, a 3D puzzle, as a demonstrator and as a test-bed to evaluate different means for augmented assembly setups. The experimental results show that the system with augmented reality has high effectiveness ratio. The system can also reduce assembly time, and therefore, the system embedded with an augmented reality would be a new trend to improve the assemblability

Preliminary system evaluation results are presented, the user experience is discussed and some directions for future work are given.