2021 Brazil-Japan Collaborative Program on Naval Architecture and Offshore Engineering

Name:
University:
Date: 24/05/2021

Title of Report: IHIMU-Alpha System In Shipbuilding

The “IHIMU-a” system is the result of an evolution of the first “IHI-a” system, built in 1997 to automatically
bend steel plates. The latest system is capable of automatically handling all processes, from the evaluation of curved
shapes to the judgment of the need for correction of the shapes, thus supplying the manual work imposed on the first
system, as well as the calculation and implementation of heating plans correction when necessary. The most recent
system uses two articulated robots with seven axes to handle the heating coil applied as a heat source and can be used to
create bowl-shaped plates, which represents a large part of the curved shell plates that the first system had difficulty with
generate. In addition, the newer system can automatically turn steel plates to heat its opposite surface, as the heating
plans provided by the system require it to happen. Thus allowing autonomous operation for all processes, with the
exception of loading and unloading steel plates. The heating plans provided by the system accept the formation of a
curved shell with light or medium curvature within acceptable precision limits, except in the case of thick plates such as
those used for the construction of the stern and sharp curvature such as the bulbous arch that need further technological
development.
The heating lines are applied on a steel plate, especially on the front and on the rear surfaces of the plate, to
make the desired curve for ships, but needing a combine technique of four deformations can be caused by thermal stress.
These four mechanisms of deformations can be presented as an orthogonal direction and tangential direction, each having
deformation by out of plane bending and deformation by in plane shrinkage.
For heating sequence must first it is needed a loading of steel plate to start the IHIMU-a system heating plan,
by then it’s used two 7 axis articulated robots to handle the heating coil, in the first place they need to detect the steel
plate position, then heat, cool and adjust jack height. These robots can effectively shrink the edges of the plate, by holding
it from both sides and edges for a planned period of time. At the same time as the plates are molding, forty-six motorized
jacks are arranged of a platform and their heights are adjusted automatically. After that, the IHIMU-a system sprays
cooling water around the heating coil, from up above the steel plate, so it can bent properly. The system also have water
jet nozzles at the top of the motorized jacks, so it can spray water from below the steel plate to cool it, resolving the water
holes created in spite of the flow. The heating sequence requires the steel plate to be heated from both sides and to be
turned over for at least three times before the desired forming is achieved, as well as needing a laser measurement of
shape after all of the previous steps. Fortunately, the system has a mechanism for the evaluation measurement results that
is very effectively. The final step of this sequence, it can be done by the IHIMU-a system, as in checking if the previous
plans are correct, if correctly the unloading of processed steel plate is occurred, if not it can automatically proceed to
calculate the correction heating.
The heat input, is part of the heating plan presented before as a consequence of the input data just like the FEM
(Finite Element Method) model of target shape, thickness and material of the steel plate. As an output data the heat input
is actually the speed at which heating is to be performed.