A neuro‐fuzzy control system for intelligent overlock sewing machines

A neuro‐fuzzy control model has been devised for the next generation of so‐called “intelligent sewing machines”. The model incorporates discrimination of material characteristics to be stitched by automatic determination of their properties. The fabric/machine interactions at different speeds have been computed in the form of linguistic rules of a fuzzy model and implemented in a neural network to allow for optimization of fuzzy membership functions and, subsequently, self‐learning. The model is successfully applied to an instrumented industrial sewing machine.