Industry 4.0 and augmenting the millennial worker

Project aim

The aim of the project is to evaluate how augmented reality (AR) based instructions can improve the maintenance of offshore wind turbines, by developing and testing a prototype AR system in a real offshore environment

Project background

The Renewable Engine programme is a cross-border collaboration to contribute to research in the fields of Renewable Energy and Advanced Manufacturing, where students work between an academic institution and local industrial partner.

This project is in collaboration with a local company, Booth Welsh, to discover how Industry 4.0 technologies can improve asset availability in offshore wind turbines. In particular, it will explore how augmented reality (AR) can be used to improve error rates and completion times of maintenance tasks, by superimposing relevant data, instructions, and guidance onto technicians’ view of the real world. Implementation costs and potential savings will also be assessed to determine the types of task which might most benefit from these technologies. A prototype AR system will then be built and tested on a real wind turbine, to verify performance outside of controlled laboratory conditions.