A wire harness is a bundle of individual wires that carry signals or working currents. The cables are in a wire harness connected by clamps, cable ties, twine or hoses. The cables are combined according to design specifications on a special workbench or on a nail board to a wiring harness and clamped together. This only limited tree is then installed. Harnesses are usually assembled according to the geometric and electrical requirements.
Despite advancing automation, harnesses in the automotive industry continue to be manufactured manually, which will remain so in the foreseeable future. This is largely due to the many different movements involved:
* the threading of cables or strands into hoses or the threading of shrink tubing,
* the wrapping with fabric tape, especially at branches of cable strands,
* the striking of contacts to the lines, in particular in so-called double attacks,
* the nesting of hoses,
* the fixing of strands with tape, clamps or cable ties.
These movements are obviously difficult to automate. Nevertheless, these activities are easy to learn even with low professional qualifications. Thus, manual production is still more cost-effective than automation. In certain vehicles, such as the truck, a large number of variants is added, which results in a very small lot size.
Nevertheless, different variants are made on the same form boards. Especially here, the human is still at an advantage compared to the machine, because he is in a short time can switch to different variants. To reduce the variety of variants, quantities of wiring harness variants can be combined into stages. The prefabrication can be partially automated:
* the cutting of single lines,
* striking contacts on one or both sides of a line,
* the partial loading of the connector housing with pre-contacted cables,
* the welding of several cables ends,
* the twisting of wires.
The test of the electrical function of a cable harness can be carried out with the aid of a test bench. The test bench is programmed beforehand with the data of the circuit diagram.