Heavy Machinery Maintenance Procedure Evaluations in XR (VR)

Here we show how off-highway and heavy industrial vehicle OEMs can leverage digital design assets to experience firsthand future products in realistic simulations of human-performed processes. Conducting such Human-Centric Product & Process Validations in the VR Solution IC.IDO stakeholders in engineering, design, manufacturing engineering, and even marketing can effectively transport themselves into the future anywhere in the world where the new products will be produced.

Service procedure planning for future products is often complicated and potentially delayed by a lack of availability of physical examples of the intended object (Loader, excavator, or harvester for example). Methods for documenting processes for removing and replacing componentry often rely on having an experienced service-maintenance professional “teardown” or disassemble actual products. In those circumstances, if the technician discovers incompatibility between the design of the product and feasibility of the service task, it might be too late to resolve the issue cost-effectively.

In some cases, one might find that the required procedure to remove or replace a component could place the operator at risk of injury or worse. How can we prove that a process is safe or not, without putting the human operator at risk? By making it possible for them to safely perform the installation or removal on virtual assets that behave in a physically realistic manner.

With ESI IC.IDO users can be immersed in a virtual service or product environment, they can pick up and interact with the proposed products, and perform the tasks in Virtual Reality. XR, extended reality, solutions like IC.IDO provide a safe collaborative validation space where stakeholders can bring in their future product designs, introduce plausible tooling, and participate in true-to-life simulations of the processes required for the new product. All without investing in or waiting for physical construction of mock-ups and minimizing non-value-added coding or programming of games.