Artificial intelligence and its advantages in everyday production have long been a topic of discussion in industry - but as initially with Industry 4.0, promising words are still rarely followed by corresponding deeds. In the surface industry, there have been few concrete approaches in this direction so far, and those that do exist are mainly aimed at the automotive industry. Now, however, a new strategic cooperation between two companies promises an application perspective for plant control with artificial intelligence that is also suitable for general industry. This involves the world's first and comprehensive closed-loop solution for partially and fully automated powder coating processes - according to coatingAI. Although this is not the first time the term Closed-Loop has been mentioned in our industry, until now it has mainly meant the adjustment of a single parameter - the powder quantity. Taking into account the numerous factors influencing a coating system, from humidity and temperature to electrostatics and particle size distribution in powder coating, the approach of reacting to variations in coating thickness solely by changing the powder output is only promising to a limited extent.
The still young company coatingAI is pursuing the approach here of including all the important parameters relating to a powder coating process in the algorithm, in order to enable optimum system settings even under difficult conditions. According to Marlon Boldrini, CEO of coatingAI AG, the algorithm is already ready to be tested in practice on two-dimensional, simple components. The current or future further development of the algorithm depends very much on precise and also areal coating thickness measurement, which can be used to learn the effects of variations in individual parameters. In this respect, the strategic partnership now sealed with Coatmaster, the manufacturer and developer of photothermal coating thickness measurement equipment, is an important step. "The combination of Coatmaster's Advanced Thermal Optics technology for non-contact coating thickness measurement and intelligent algorithm-driven computer vision and machine learning technologies harnesses two powerful tools of the digital age to deliver real benefits for businesses - and the environment," said Boldrini.
Prof. Dr. Nils Reinke, Co-Founder & Co-CEO of coatmaster AG, comments, "With the strategic collaboration with coatingAI, we are creating a milestone in powder coating. Two major challenges are in particular focus: the production of quality coatings and overcoming the shortage of skilled workers - with the best possible plant profitability."
Even though the coatingAI algorithm will still require development work before it can actually be used in daily coating practice, it offers realistic potential to achieve very high process stability and process autonomy for powder coating processes, which, due to the many influencing factors taken into account on coating plants, is well beyond what even the most experienced plant operators can achieve. Even under the increasing shortage of highly qualified employees, such an algorithm could be a promising prospect.
Read more about the possible quality improvements in practice through photothermal measurement methods - coming soon in issue 4/2022 of Surface Technology magazine and on oberflaeche.de.