1 Scope

This document specifies an OPC UA Information Model for the representation of a wire harness manufacturing system. It creates a common interface among different wire harness manufacturing technologies, manufacturers and model series. The OPC UA for Wire Harness Manufacturing interface allows the exchange of information between the wire harness manufacturing system and software systems like MES, SCADA, ERP or data analytics systems. The information model describes many different processes a wire harness manufacturing machine can perform.

The wire harness industry is an integrated system that consists of several production steps:

  1. Wire cutting: Cutting, crimping and sealing of the individual wire strands that form the final product.
  2. Harness assembly: All wire strands are placed together on an assembly board, placed in the proper casings and taped together
  3. Testing: The quality and characteristics of raw materials, intermediate parts, and the final wire harness are tested throughout production to ensure that the final product meets quality standards and is produced in accordance with functional and non-functional requirements.

There are multiple types of equipment for manufacturing the final wire harness product. The most common categories include:

  • Cutting machines: Used to cut wires to specific lengths.
  • Stripping machines: Strip the insulation from the ends of wires.
  • Crimping machines: Used to attach terminals or connectors to the ends of wires.
  • Soldering/tinning stations: Used for soldering or tinning wire ends.
  • Wire twisting machines: Used to twist multiple wires together.
  • Wire marking machines: Mark wires for identification purposes.
  • Bundling machines: Bundle wires together into a harness.
  • Tie wraps and tubing machines: Used for applying tie wraps and shrinking tubing for additional wire protection.
  • Test machines: Perform various tests to ensure that raw materials, intermediate parts, and the final wire harness meet quality standards and are produced in accordance with functional and non-functional requirements.

Some machines combine multiple of these categories; some realize a combination of these categories and may include (partial) processes performed by the operator.

This Companion Specification focuses only on some of the processes in the wire cutting area of manufacturing, and only covers single core and single layer wire.

An overview of the relevant processes covered by this specification can be found in Section 4.1.4