Feasibility study of an augmented reality application to enhance the operators' safety in the usage of a fruit extractor

This paper proposes a framework to carry out a feasibility study of the implementation of augmented reality (AR) systems in the manufacturing context, to enhance the safety of employees in carrying out maintenance tasks. AR systems are recognized as effective tools to help a user perform tasks and operations, by adding virtual information (such as livevideo stream, pictures, or instructions) to the real-world environment. A feasibility study and its application to a real context has been carried on in collaboration with a primary manufacturer of food equipment. The targeted machine is a hot-break juice extractor, manufactured by the company; the machine is used to separate juice from fruit pieces The operation where the AR systems is intended to be applied is a maintenance task, concerning the cleaning or substitution of the porous sieves of the machine. Such a task should be carried out at least every 12 hours of functioning of the machine. The main steps for the development of the AR solution, as well as the expected pros/cons of its implementation and usage are discussed.