Low-Latency Vision for Conveyor Anomaly Detection
The challenge
Manufacturing lines require instantaneous anomaly detection and automated shutdown or actuation. Cloud processing incurs latency and network dependency that is unacceptable for safety-critical responses. The business need was a vision system to detect jams and foreign objects with deterministic low latency and high reliability, a core requirement for any solution.
What we built
EurthTech delivered an on-device computer vision pipeline that detects anomalies (blockages, misfeeds, spillages) in conveyor lines with sub-200 ms end-to-end latency. The Edge AI embedded system uses a local TPU or small GPU accelerator for real-time inference. When an anomaly is confirmed, the node immediately triggers a local hardware interlock, ensuring immediate automated gating and aligning perfectly with a Predictive maintenance AI IoT strategy.
How it works
The embedded systems development utilized a two-stage pipeline to reduce compute: a lightweight motion detector triggers a compact CNN classifier (MobileNetV2/pruned\ResNet) for anomaly classification. We achieved an inference latency under 25ms through model quantisation and pruning. To meet safety timing, the pipeline used hard real-time scheduling and a redundant watchdog logic requiring two independent anomaly confirmations within 100ms. This showcases our advanced engineering.
Results
Bench tests measured a detection TPR of 0.96 and FPR < 0.02. Field trials across three lines significantly reduced manual stops by 67% and prevented material spill damage, with an estimated savings of 18% in line downtime. The system also produced a timestamped event log for root-cause analysis, demonstrating a high ROI solution for automated manufacturing.
Scalability & GIS Context: The solution integrates with PLCs/SCADA and provides escalation flows. By creating a deterministic, local Vision node, this system acts as a key component of the factory's Digital twin smart city model, providing the ground truth data for OEE and flow optimization. This capability is a natural extension of our GIS consulting company expertise into the industrial indoor environment.