Automated Garment Manufacturing System Using Novel Sensing and Actuation

Attempts to automate the sewing process of garment manufacturing have employed substitutes for human guidance of fabric into somewhat conventional sewing machines. A new approach has been proposed and partially verified in prototype form. It consists of several subsystems responsible for 1) gross fabric motion, 2) precision detection of the fabric location and 3) exact placement of the needle in the fabric. Gross motion employs steerable rollers capable of moving the fabric. Fine fabric motion employs vision sensing technology to count threads in the fabric. Exact placement employs servo controlled dogs for moving the fabric to exactly place the needle. This paper will explain the concept and the extent of verification of its realization. INTRODUCTION Clothing is one of the three basic necessities of human life and a means of personal expression. As such, clothing or garment manufacturing is one of the oldest and largest industries in the world. However, unlike other mass industries such as the automobile industry, the apparel industry is primarily supported by a manual production line. This paper proposes a system of automation which diverges from previous attempts in several ways, most notably in the immediate objective of the process and also the means of achieving it. The objective becomes placement of each stitch between the correct threads of the warp and weft (fill) of the component pieces of fabric, to be achieved by novel sensing and material handling devices. If this can be achieved, the resulting garment will have the proper shape when draped over the wearer’s body. The need for automation in garment manufacturing has been recognized by many since the early 1980s and is discussed comprehensively by Byrne [1 A joint $55 million program between the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) and industry, called the TRAAS program, was started in 1982. The ultimate goal of the program was to automate the garment manufacturing process from start, with a roll of fabric, to finish, with a complete, inspected garment. While the project claimed to be successful, and did demonstrate a method to produce tailored women's jackets, it failed to compete with traditional methodologies. ] and summarized here. During the 1980s, millions of dollars were spent on apparel industry research in the United States, Japan and industrialized Europe. Draper Laboratories in the U.S. was provided with $25 million of support from the government and industry with the goal of automating parts of the sewing process, beginning with setting a sleeve into a coat and then moving to automated seaming. In Europe, the BRITE project put millions of dollars towards automated sewing. Neither program resulted in successfully automating the entire process, although some minor gains were made. CURRENT GARMENT MANUFACTURING SYSTEMS Conventional Industrial Sewing Machines Current industrial sewing is done mostly by hand with some processes being semi-autonomous. Cutting stacks of fabric, for example, is readily performed by NC machines, and pockets can be automatically sewn. The primary tool for the core process is the standard sewing machine, partially shown in Fig. 1. The important components with regard to this paper are