Abstract:

We conducted a study of a methodology during the Spring of 2018, 2019 and 2020 applied to a subject called “Monitoring and Control Systems” of the Master in Industrial Engineering. This paper proposes a vision of the subject for the next-generation monitoring, analysis, and control functions for tomorrow's smart system control industries.

The idea of this methodology has been born from real projects for monitoring and control systems implemented from the Electronic Technology Area of the Universidad Rey Juan Carlos (URJC), together with the Electronic Technology Laboratory (LABTEL), also from the URJC, such as Cianomod, Belenus and HelpResponder. Those projects are oriented to environmental monitoring and to take decisions in real time for first responders security services. The experience acquired developing those project has been transferred to this subject as a methodology, so that the students learn what tools, software and hardware is necessary in this type of projects. The objective of the study was to provide an opportunity to the students to develop interdisciplinary solutions to real-world problems. These monitoring and control systems are conceptually very similar to those used in the Industry 4.0, so the methodology is directly applicable.

The real project that the students will face is the developing of a weather station. For this development, the collaborative project approach have been used because it allows engineering students to learn from their colleagues and improve skills necessary for team working. The students worked together in small teams to solve, design and develop embedded system based monitoring and control systems. I also include data acquisition and storage and remote web based monitoring. Several items have been chose for this development:
- First, there is a review of the present Industry 4.0 technology and then the vision of the next-generation monitoring, analysis, and control functions based on IoT (Internet of Things) is presented. There are also identified the technology and infrastructure gaps that must be filled, and a roadmap to realize the proposed project is developed.
- Second, the students acquire knowledge of the basics of programming systems based on both Open Source Hardware and commercial development environments (design, simulation and final deployment).
- Third, they will be guide to review in the next order the advance in industrial buses and communications protocols, knowledge in electrical installations, electromagnetic compatibility and advanced instrumentation, also related to Industry 4.0.
- Four, this methodology is also completed with visits to companies dedicated to the Industry 4.0 sector. Internship plans and scholarships are offered in these companies.

Each team had to face a problem statement of the weather station, design a solution, simulate the solution using appropriate software, implement the solution in hardware and prepare a report according to the previous items. The students had to complete the project in 12 weeks. When the students have finished this subject they start with the final Master Thesis, where they could apply the knowledge acquired in this subject. This resulted in better motivation among students because the items and methodology (technology transfer) is close to the Industry 4.0 requirements. The developed and evaluated techniques on this subject are general and applicable to any other subject and discipline of engineering.

Keywords:

Monitoring, Sensors, Open Source Hardware, Team-Based and Collaborative Learning.