Conceptualizing Cloneable Automation

Sammanfattning

This thesis conceptualizes cloneable automation and examines which attributes and prerequisites can make an automation solution possible to replicate across contexts with limited re engineering and remaining usable for its intended users. The study is based on an exploratory qualitative design guided by Design Research Methodology. The work combines a literature study with semi structured interviews with automation experts, two site visit at the case company, and recurring case related discussions. The final case oriented part of the thesis is treated as a prescriptive study, where the descriptive understanding is translated into tentative guidelines for PLC, robotics, and HMI. The result shows that reuse in current automation practice already exists, but most often as partial reuse of base programs, libraries, HMI structures, and earlier concepts rather than as full instantiation of a finished solution. The most time consuming work is concentrated in PLC and software logic, robot application logic, communication and interface integration, HMI adaptation, commissioning, safety work, validation, and the installed base. The second site visit material supports this result and also show that practical cloneability depends on company ownership of code and knowledge, mandatory documentation as part of the delivery workflow, reusable PLC and robot blocks, a stable core with bounded local variation through parameters and recipes, and standards that remain teachable and usable. In this thesis, attributes define what cloneability is, while guidelines explain how those attributes can be operationalized in PLC, robot, and HMI design. The main conclusion is that cloneable automation is described as engineered reuse built around a stable, documented, bounded, and usable core rather than copy based reuse of duplicated artefacts.