To increase productivity and ease of implementation, FANUC has developed dedicated robotic software made specifically for pick and place robotic operations - Packaging software that can coordinate multiple robots picking and packing 2,000 items per minute on a line. This type of packaging automation not only lowers your costs versus manual labor, but also saves you valuable production time.
Robotic visual line tracking technology provides multiple pick and place robots with human-like eye-hand coordination skills, enabling them to measure, robotically sort and pick loose parts on a moving conveyor using an integrated robot vision system.
Fanuc Line Tracking Manual
The iRVision 3D Area Sensor uses a projector unit for 3D measurements. 3D data is measured in a wide area by projecting structured light very quickly for reliable detection. A 3DV Sensor may be used for depalletizing, kitting, tote picking, presence/absence check, 3D visual line tracking and many more applications. The 3DV Sensor is also ideal for 2D applications with low contrast or hard to find targets.
iRVision 2D functionality can be added to iRPickTool to support the detection of randomly placed parts on a moving conveyor. This way, the iRPickTool equips single or multiple robots with the ability to identify, pick and place items in linear and/or circular conveyor tracking. This is supported by a wide range of features including advanced queue management, buffering and tray functionality.
A Remtec designed robotic system using two FANUC SR-6iA SCARA robots and a custom feeding system has been successfully improving loading and unloading efficiency for tubes of pet flea drops. The robots provide visual line tracking to randomly pick and place one, two, or three tubes depending on the needs of retail product package configuration.
Custom robotic system from Kaufman Engineered Systems utilizes a FANUC M-2iA Series Delta robot to orient cans with the assistance of FANUC iR vision and line tracking to be packed into cases and trays.
The wider use of automation in solar seems inevitable as the industry matures. The use of automation and robotics to be more competitive is a growing trend in solar manufacturing. The automotive industry has been leading user groups but a lot of other industries are catching up. The solar industry has found that it can produce panels faster, cheaper, and with higher quality without a lot of manual operations, and this will continue whether the products are made in the United States or in a foreign country, says Fanucs Melton. We are selling a lot of automation equipment into China right now. But we also have seen a lot of manufacturers bring their production lines back to the United States from abroad by adding automation, lean manufacturing and six sigma [tools for process improvement], he says. Tom Baric, the engineering manager of industrial products for Parker Hannifin, based in Irwin, Pennsylvania, confirms this trend: Solar has to be highly automated to be competitive. We are seeing that as labor rates rise in China, companies are pulling back to the United States. We provide motion components ranging from the sub-micron scale to a millimeter or two, and from handling ounces to several hundred pounds, he adds. Another robot maker helping the solar industry manufacture more efficiently is Adept Technology, which offers small, medium and large machines. Most of our robots are used in cell handling for which we have a new four-axis robot, the Cobra S800, which is extremely fast and precise, says Banducci. Our robots have integrated vision systems and they can pick up a cell off a stack, hold it on a camera to take a picture, put it over a flash tester, then stack the cells according to their particular quality, he says. The S800 can move a cell several feet in 0.4 seconds, and one user measured the robots cycle time to pick up a cell, hold it over a camera and do a flash test at less than 2.25 seconds, he said. We also have other robots that can pick up and position a string of cells, and an even larger robot to handle a full panel, he notes. Speed is pointless without precision, however, which separates humans from machines. While it is true that our machines offer cost savings over labor, in the solar industry particularly, the reality is that the greatest benefit is the quality of the work, says Banducci. With robotics there is less breakage and the end result is very consistent: Theres no subjectivity and there are no mistakes the fewer times people touch cells the better a product you will have, he says. Apart from a centralized manufacturing site, solar product makers also can use transportable modular automated lines to create production close to an installation site. There can be a significant cost for shipping solar products to more distant locations, so you can manufacture more cost effectively even in a high cost region if you can cut the logistics costs, notes Banducci. Apart from providing product just in time you can also meet content requirements more readily, in places like Brazil, he says. 2ff7e9595c
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