Automation & Robotics:Part 1 - Image-based systems

Across the various industries in Asia, technology is enabling manufacturers to perform metalworking processes with speed, precision and efficiency.

Despite slower global economic growth, Asia’s manufacturing market is still poised for greater expansion in the long term. Many industry sectors require supply chain traceability and a high level of production accuracy. These are opportunities for manufacturers to tool up with image-based technology from Cognex to improve efficiency, productivity and profitability.

Industrial sectors like shipbuilding, automotives and aerospace manufacturing, require precision in processes for welding, inspecting and handling metal parts and components. Robots can play an important role in these functions, offering superhuman speeds and ease of movement.

In a facility that manufactures car side panels, robots move between steel sheets to check, pick up, and place the sheets in the welding station. They then collect the welded sheet parts and deliver them to another station for additional testing. Essentially, the visionguided pick-and-place processes take care of both the transport and the Quality Control (QC) of raw materials and completed components on the production line.

Synchronised precision

The process begins with one robot placing itself in front of the component magazine where small parts are arranged horizontally. It measures the position of the parts and grabs the individual components by positioning its gripper correctly in three-dimensional space. The gripping is performed in two separate steps. First, a vacuum suctions the parts and enables pins to secure the sheets. Meanwhile, a second robot positions itself with its two-sided gripping system in front of the transport rack, where large parts are arranged vertically in a stack. This robot checks the position of the transport lock, measures the positions of the parts, and picks up the required components. After this, both the robots travel to the loading station (a turntable), and place the parts in the right positions and in the correct sequence. All this is made possible with the VisionPro software driven 3D vision system that recognizes the position of each component and any possible distortions in its positioning. This information is then forwarded to the robot controller. The latter then guides the gripper to move to the actual location of a part in real-time before picking it up. In this manner, production quality is improved as the machine operator can focus on ensuring that the entire operation runs smoothly, instead of being distracted by components that may be incorrectly loaded or unloaded along the way.