Design of an Automated Wiring Harness Manufacturing Machine Product development and impact assessment of a novel manufacturing system

Abstract

The increasing smartification of vehicles, including heavy vehicles like trucks leads to greater demands and higher complexity when it comes to the vehicle’s nerve system; electrical wiring. Supplying low-voltage and signals, wiring harnesses experience high variation due to the practically endless truck configurations. This, combined with a high level of manual manufacturing makes wiring harnesses among the most expensive components of a truck. Current manual manufacturing methods were found to be costly both operationally and during product changes. Addressing this, previous attempts at automation of harness manufacturing have either not proceeded past the patenting stage, or not included manufacturing of chassis harnesses, that require additional operations like adding of protections. This thesis examines relevant literature and seeks to develop an automated manufacturing solution from the ground-up, supported both by established product development methods like functional decomposition tree, morphological matrix, elimination matrix, and Pugh matrix, and practical test-design-build cycles with an emphasis on early testing with rapid prototyping. The development process resulted in a modular and expandable manufacturing system capable of manufacturing selected signal harnesses. In addition, the thesis explores what impact the widespread implementation of the automated solution would have on the wider manufacturing process, wiring engineering, ethical areas, and on the economics of the company were such a system is implemented. The findings are discussed and recommendations for automation are presented, including component standardisation, design for automation, and technology leadership.