1

Siddhesh Laxman Deokar 2

Department of Mechanical Engineering, New Horizon Institute of Management And Studies, Anand
Nagar, Thane
1deokarsiddhesh007@gmail.com 2
Email :-

__________________________________________________________________________

ABSTRACT :- Automation and robotics is the emerging and most rapidly growing site.
Automation and robotics is the future of coming world. Robotics and automation is going
to occupy a major part of all fields. Human being is the animal who always looks upto
possible ways that can provide comfort and reduce efforts and risks and increase the
efficiency. And hence Robotics and Automation is the only field that can help to complete
our expectations. There is no possible future without robotics and automation, and this
has been proven in recent times by some major firms which have implemented robotics
and automation very successfully. And as any new technology enters human society it
has both pros and cons, same is applied to robotics and automation. Even it has some
social impacts on human society. This paper will try to cover all possible aspects related
to robotics and automation.
KEYWORDS :- Robotics, Automation, Future, Tesla, Amazon, Social Impact.
INTRODUCTION
Robotics and automation can go hand in hand. They are interrelated terms upto a large extend.
We can even say that robots can be used to do automation. They both has some similarities
and some differences upto some extend. Robotics and Automation used together in any field
can surely boost the progress more than expectations. Accepting and Implementing Robotics
and Automation is becoming a major need. But there are also some differences between
robotics and automation.
AUTOMATION
The simplest way in which we can define automation is as “It is the process of making any
thing automatic thus reducing existing problems. “ There is no restrictions over how the
process of automation should take place. It can be done with the help of electricity, hydraulic,
pneumatic, mechanically or by any other mean possible. Automation are done for specific
task.
The automation term or automation word is not much older but the automation process exists
from ancient times. Even in ancient times automation process was in use. As human has an
urge to reduce its work or make its work more easy to be done. So humans from ancient times
were trying to do automation upto some extend. Some simple examples are vending machines
and alarm clocks from olden days. In today’s world we can refer it as the simplest automatic
process but we can’t refuse that it was a part of automation.
ROBOTICS
Robotics is the process of developing, programming, upgrading, repairing or any other
operation that can be done on the robots. Robots are any machine that can operate by itself
and complete any ask assigned without any human participation. They are programmed with
help of software and operated by electric signals. They can replicate human motions.
Robotics is from a recent times. As per studies found on internet earliest robot is from 1950.
Concept of robots were not in existence before that. It took many years for humans to get
convinced by the performance of robots.
BASICS OF ROBOTICS AND AUTOMATION
There are basically five basic parts of an automation system-
1. Action element
2. Sensing mechanism.
3. Control element
4. Decision element
5. Program
The basic parts of any robots are
1. Power supply
2. Actuators.
3. Electric motor
4. Sensors.
5. Controller .
SOME OF THE REAL WORLD USES OF ROBOTICS AND AUTOMATION
1) AMAZON WAREHOUSE
It is a place where a major part of order execution is done by the robots. As like other major
firms around the world even they have some robotics arms used to palletize packages. They
are equipped with grippers which identify pickup packages from the conveyor belts and then
stack them on pallets. They even have some robotics arm which are used to lift pallets of
inventory to different levels in fulfillment centers. Also called as robo stows They can even
place them on small driving units.
These driving units are a type of an AGV. These small drive units are fully automated and
work in an area where humans are not allowed to enter inside. These drive units can drive
themselves without any collision. They are used to safely transfer packages or products from
one place to another without any fatal. They can transfer a multiple number of products a time.
This reduces the major human efforts. These drive units are mostly used to transfer products
from a place where they were stored to the conveyor belts during their order execution process.
They have 1,00,000 drive units in their warehouses all around the world, along with six robo
stows and thirty palletizers.
The drive units are designed such that they should not collide with each other also they should
navigate themselves through the warehouse in order to travel from one place to another.
During these process they are helped with many barcode stickers which are pasted on the floor
of ware house and which help them to reach their destination. These robots read the barcode
and drive themselves through their path. Also these sticker help to locate each other so that
they can avoid the collisions.

2) TESLA
Tesla is the one of the largest electric vehicle manufacturing company. They even aim to be
the largest automated firm worldwide. So in order to achieve that they implementing the
robots. Robots work in tesla factory to complete variety of task. Almost everything has been
automated. As like drive units in amazon warehouse even they have smart carts which are
used to transfer car parts from one place to another. These AGVs at tesla are known as the
smart carts. These smart cart navigates themselves by using magnetic strips which are pasted
on the floor. These magnetic strips also help to locate themselves at factory floor.
They even have a robotic arm which is programmed to perform multiple tasks, also known as
kuka robots. These kuka robots can rivet, weld, glue, and move part from one position to
another . the most strongest robot they have is funac. It is specially design to perform heavy
workloads. It can easily do for times more work than any other conventional robot. It can take
up weights about 1.2 tonnes. The another version of funac called funac M-2000IA900 can take
up a weight upto 2.3 tonnes. These robots has movements in six axis. Tesla has twelve such
robots working in their factories. They lift nearly 7500 cars in a single week.
They also have robotics arms working at their paint body shop. Each car is painted with a help
of for such robotic arms. Tesla has implemented some part of robotics even outside of their
factories. The charging stations of tesla are also automated by using robots. When a tesla is
parked near a charging station then it a robotic plug automatically comes out of the car and
puts itself inside the charging plug of the car.
3) reCaptcha
As discussed earlier it is not necessary that automation should take place only in field related
to machines. Automation can reduce human efforts even in the IT sector. Some of the
examples of IT Automation are being used by us unknowingly in day todays life. One of this
example is reCaptcha service by google.
Originally it was not used by google and any other social media platforms. Captcha is
generally a used to reduce the time and efforts used to distinguish between robots and human
beings. The initial purpose of this was in field where books are digitize in order to create a e-
copy of those books. Books were used to get converted into word format people were free to
suggest edits for spellings of words. If such request reach a satisfactory and pre programmed
numbers then that word used to get replaced automatically to make correction. With help of
this it took only 2 years for google books and new York times to digitize their material.
When we try to login or we reach a number of wrong password attempts above which our
access can get blocked those websites or applications ask us to verify that whether you are a
robot or a human being. They ask us to click on a specific box or retype a word from any
image. Or they jus ask us to select some specific pictures from a group of random pictures. On
the basis of the wrong or correct attempt site categorize us as human or bot. and depending
upon the their decision we can get blocked or can get access to their site or application
automatically.
HOW ROBOTICS WILL DIFFER FROM AUTOMATION
Although we have seen that how robotics and automation is same and interdependent upto
some extend, but they even have some huge difference in between them. The main difference
between them lies in their definition. Robotics is used for robots which are specialized
machines which are an object, whereas automation is referred to a process of making things
or tasks work automatically.
It is not necessary that automation is always implemented to solve real world problem or what
we say is hardware related problems. Many times automation is used in field of software also.
But this is not incase of robots. Robots are always implemented to solve the real world
problems. Robotics cant be employed to automate any software it always helps to automate
only hardware processes. An example of this is GUI also known as Graphic User Interface
where different human actions are recorded during their use and these data is further used by
the system. This process is an automated process by use of software.
Robotics are the single machines which can be reprogrammed again and again to perform
different variety of tasks as on other hand while doing automation sometimes you may need
to rewrite the program however we have seen that robotics and automation are interdependent,
but there is hidden condition in this statement. When a robot is not performing any task and
roaming from here to there then we cant say that it is a automation process. To make it more
simpler we can have a look on AGVs which we saw in previous examples. If AGVs are just
following magnetic strips or barcodes and roaming then it is a part of robotics but when these
robots start carrying different objects from one place to another then it becomes a part of the
automation.
As mentioned above robotics needs specific electric signals in order to execute the movements.
They require it to drive their different moving parts. Robotics cant work without electric
signals. Whereas automation can be done by using any kind of the working medium it can be
hydraulic, pneumatic, electric, or only mechanical.
ADVANTAGES OF ROBOTICS AND AUTOMATION
 It reduces the human effort and human interference.
 Reduces the cost of the production.
 It can work in conditions where humans can’t work. Example – space.
 It drastically improves the quality of product.
 It reduces the time required for production .
 It provides the highest accuracy possible.
 It ensures the efficient use of material.
DISADVANTAGES OF ROBOTICS AND AUTOMATION
 Human jobs gets replaced on large scale.
 Breakdowns and failures can lead to a major headache.
 They both need a working medium.
  They need maintenance time to time. It costs money and time in retraining, repairing,
maintaining.
 Making correction in their programmed data is not as easy as human brain.
 Initial investment is very high.
 At many times robots and automation process can’t work and react outside of what
they are programmed. Human has their own senses and many times can react to
changing environment without any external assistance and pre programmed
commands.
SOCIAL IMPACTS OF ROBOTICS AND AUTOMATION
From all above we are very much cleared that there is no way to run away or escape from
robotics and automation. But everything should be under human control if it’s getting involved
into human society. There is a lot of hate and unacceptance in some specific group of people.
We cant regret and ignore the facts which are claimed by them. But we can’t also stop using
robotics and automation . The only way to implement robotics and automation without any
hate is finding a better way to accept it.
As example the biggest problem faced by implementation of robotics and automation is fear
of losing jobs. It is true that people will lose jobs due to robotics and automation but we can’t
ignore the fact that robotics and automation also creates jobs. Only thing that gets affected
during this is that there is a huge change in job specifications. Due to robotics and automation
unskilled labors will lose their jobs but skilled and educated group of people will get a huge
job opportunities. So one thing is to learn from it is that we should be concentrating to provide
skills and education to all people so that they can shift from unskilled work. And this should
not be considered as the disadvantage as because humans can’t run away from the education.
So if we see from other point of view robotics and automation will also help to accelerate the
need of education. which will help the human to get away from heavy unskilled works and
instead it will help to boost development of human society.
CONCLUSION
There are certain changes that keeps impacting human societies. In past years we have seen
such evolution in form of plastic and mobile phones. These were the biggest events in human
history. In todays age you will not find anyone who has never used a phone and plastic. By
analyzing the impact of robotics and automation on human society one thing that can surely
be predicted is robotics and automation is going to turn up as the next big event in human
history.