Robotics & Automation (OE65)

Module III

Robot applications in Manufacturing

Dr. Manjunath C.T.

Assistant Professor
Mechanical Engineering, SIT
Robot Applications in Manufacturing

• Material handling
• Material transfer applications

• Machine loading and unloading

• Process operations

• Assembly and Inspection

Material handling applications

• Material transfer:
• Robot grasps and moves a workpart from one location to another
• Machine loading and/or unloading:
• Robot is used to load and/or unload the part or machine
• Examples:
• Metal-machining operations
• Die casting
• Plastic molding
• Forging operations
General considerations in robot material handling

• Part positioning and orientation

• Gripper Design
• Minimum distance moved
• Robot work volume
• Robot weight capacity
• Accuracy and repeatability
• Robot configuration, degrees of freedom, and control
• Machine utilization problems
 Material handling applications→Material Transfer Applications

• Primary objective to move a part from one location to another

location

• Straightforward robot application, hence the construction

requirement and working of robot is simple

• Also called as pick and place operations

• Advanced applications such as palletizing and depalletizing

operations requires more sophisticated robots

VII Semester, 2022-23, Department of Mechanical Engineering, SIT

Material handling applications→Material Transfer→Pick-and-
place operations
• Robot picks up a part at one
location and moves it to another
location
• Procedure:
• Part is presented to the robot by
some mechanical device or conveyor
in a known location and orientation
• Stationary location is achieved either
by stopping the conveyor or by using
a mechanical stop
• An input interlock indicates that the
part is in position and ready for
pickup
• Robot will grasp the part, pick it up,
move it, and position it at a desired
location. The orientation of the part is
not changed.
Material handling applications→Material Transfer→Pick-and-
place operations

• Complications in pick-and-place operations

• Tracking of a moving pickup point
• Tracking arises when parts are carried along a continuously moving conveyor, and the
robot is required to pick parts from the conveyor
• Requires more sophisticated sensor-interlock system to determine the presence and
locations of parts in robot’s tracking window
• Information system will be required to support the workcell, to keep track of where each
item is located in the workcell

• Handling of different objects by the same robot

• Sensors should be installed to distinguish parts so that robot can execute right program
subroutine for the particular part.
• Example: Parts moving on the conveyor may have different configuration, and the
placement of the part by the robot may vary for different parts
Material handling applications→Material Transfer→Palletizing

• Handling of individual cartons or other containers, and placing them

on a pallet, and the pallet is then handled.
• Pallets can be moved mechanically within the plant or warehouse by
fork lift trucks or conveyors.
• Loading of cartons is typically heavy work and repetitive, only the
location changes from carton to carton
• The variation in carton location is in three dimensions
• Robots can be programmed by a high-level programming language to
perform this type of work.
• This feature facilitates the mathematical computation of the different
pallet locations required during the loading of a given pallet
• Leadthrough programming becomes laborious for this application
Material handling applications→Material Transfer→Palletizing

• Another technical problem that must be addressed is that when

humans perform palletizing, the cartons are randomly loaded prior to
loading.
• To aid robots, sensor scheme is used to identify these carton
locations, they must be delivered to a known pick up point for the
robot.
Material handling applications→Machine loading and
Unloading

• In this application, there are three categories

• Machine Load/unload:
• The robot loads a raw work part into the process and unloads a finished
part
• Example: Machining operation
• Machine loading:
• Machine loading The robot must load the raw work part or materials into
the machine but the part is ejected from the machine by some other
means.
• Example: In a pressworking operation, the robot may be programmed to
load sheet metal blanks into the press, finished parts drop out of press
due to gravity
• Machine unloading
• The finished part produced is unloaded from the machine using robots.
• Example: Die casting, plastic molding
Various applications in machine loading and unloading

• Die casting

• Plastic molding

• Forging and related operations

• Machining operations

• Stamping press operations

• Die casting
• Die casting is a manufacturing process in which molten metal is
forced into the cavity of a mold under high pressure. The mold is
called a die.
• Die casting production cycles consists of casting, removing the
part from the machine, quenching, and trimming.
• The die-casting process represents a relatively straightforward
application for industrial robots.
• The alterations required of the die-casting machine are minimal,
and the interlocking of the robot cycle with the machine cycle can
be accomplished by simple limit switches.
• Operated by human operators and work is hot, repetitive, dirty,
unpleasant for humans
• Due to these difficulties robots were first used in die casting
process
• Problems encountered during die casting to robots
• In the programming of the robot
• the design of the gripper to remove the part from the machine
when the die is opened.
• Difficulty in pouring the molten metal into the injection system
• Plastic Molding
• Plastic molding is a batch-volume or high-volume manufacturing process used to
make plastic parts to final shape and size.

• Injection molding is one of the important plastic molding processes

• Injection molding accomplished from injection molding machine, capable of

control over important process parameters such as temperature, pressure,
amount of material injected into mold

• Problems encountered in plastic molding to robots:

• Production times of injection molding is longer than die casting, hence robot will be idle for a
significant portion of the cycle. Humans use this idle time in cutting parts from the sprue-and-
runner system, inspecting parts, remove flash etc.

• Part inspection and flash removal are not easily accomplished by the robot

• Due to long molding cycle times, issue is whether robot should be used for one machine or
two?

• If robot is used for two machines, then the molding cycles will be different. This creates
machine interface problems, in which one machine will wait for other robot. Waiting leads to
over heating of the plastic and balance between various process parameters are disturbed
• Forging and related operations
• Metal working process in which metal is pressed or hammered into the
desired shape
• In forging, the environment is hot, noisy, environment air is polluted,
repetitive operation, requires more physical strength to move and
manipulate heavy parts
• Human being experience the blows from the drop hammer and vibrations
through the floor
• Problems encountered:
• Forging is performed on older machines and hence difficult to interface with robots
• Due to short production runs, it is difficult to justify the robot setup and programming
support for single part
• Parts stick in dies, and difficult for robots to detect
• Design of a gripper for forging so that gripper can tolerate hot temperature and
withstand shocks from the hammer blow
• Gripper must be designed to accommodate changes in the shape of parts
• Different parts requires different number of hammer blows to form final shape, robots
cannot judge but human operators can judge
• The above problems can be solved by use of interlocks and sensors
• Machining Operations
• Shape of component is changed by removing excess material with a cutting
tool
• Final form and dimensions are given to the component after primary process
such as casting or forging
• In mid-volume or high volume production, the operation is very repetitive –
same machining sequence is repeated on part after part
• Robots are used to load a raw workpart into the machine tool and to unload
the finished part at the completion of the machining cycle
• Success of machine tool load/unload depends on:
• Dual gripper
• Up to six joint motions
• Good repeatability
• Palletizing and depalletizing capability
• Programming features
• Stamping Press operations
• Forms sheet metal parts by cutting
• Robots are used for handling parts in pressworking operations
• Robot loads the flat blanks into the press for the stamping operations, and
the formed part is readily removed from the press
• Robots are also used to transfer the parts from one press to another to form
an integrated pressworking cell
• Limiting factor in using robots in pressworking is the cycle time of the press
• In pressworking the cycle time will be less than a second, which is very less
for commercially available robots
• Larger parts requires more time and the presses used for larger parts will be
slower and robots are more suitable for large parts
Processing Operations

• In processing operations, the end effector will be a tool and not a

gripper
• Type of tool depends on the processing operation
• Categories
• Spot welding
• Continuous arc welding
• Spray coating
• Miscellaneous processing operations
• Drilling, milling, grinding
• Riveting
• Waterjet cutting
• Laser drilling and cutting
• Spot Welding
• A process in which two sheet metal parts are fused together at localized points by
passing a large electric current through the parts where the weld is to be made.
• Spot welding is performed manually by two methods
• First method uses a spot-welding machine in which parts are inserted between the pair of
electrodes. Electrodes are maintained in a fixed position
• Used for relatively small parts that can be handled easily
• Second method involves manipulating a portable spot-welding tool into the position relative
to the parts
• Used in larger work such as automobile bodies

• Why robots for spot welding?

• The welding gun with cables attached is quite heavy
• Due to heavy weight, it is difficult to manipulate the welding gun by human operators and
results in decrease of production rate
• Quality of welding will decrease in the products
• Robots in Spot welding
• A welding gun is attached as the end effector to robots wrist, and the robot
is programmed to perform a sequence of welds on the product
• Features or capabilities that robots should possess in spot welding
• Robot should be relatively large
• Robot must be able to position and orient the welding gun
• Enough capacity in controller memory
• Ability to switch from one program to another

• Advantages of using robots in spot welding

• Improved product quality, operator safety, better control over the production
operation
• Improved product quality is in the form of more consistent welds accurately
than human operators.
• Improved safety results simply because the human operator is removed from
a work environment where there are hazards from shocks and burns
• Improved product scheduling and in-process inventory control
• Continuous Arc Welding
• Long welded joints in which an airtight seal is often required between
the two pieces
• Arc welding is performed by a skilled human worker, and the working
conditions are unpleasant and hazardous
• Arc from the arc from the welding process emits ultraviolet radiation
and injurious to human vision
• The high temperatures created in arc welding and the molten metals
are inherently dangerous
• The high electrical current used to create the arc is also unsafe
• Sparks and smoke are generated during the process and are potential
threat to the operator
• Problems for Robots in arc welding
• Continuous arc welding is involved in low quantity – difficult to justify
automation
• Arc welding is done in confined areas
• Presence of variations in the components that are to be welded
• Variation in dimensions of the parts
• Variations in edges and surfaces
• Industrial robots do not possess the sensing capabilities, skills, and judgement to
identify these variations
• Two approaches to compensate for these variations
• Correct stream production to reduce variations
• Provide robot with sensors
• Typical robot arc-welding operation
• Features of the welding robot
• Work volume and degrees of freedom
• Motion control system
• Precision of motion
• Interface with other systems
• Programming
• Sensors in Robotic arc welding
• Contact arc-welding sensors
• Non-contact arc-welding sensors
• Arc welding systems
• Vision based systems
• Advantages of robot arc-welding
• Higher productivity
• Improved safety and quality of work life
• Greater quality of product
• Process rationalization
Spray Coating

• Industrial coating is divided into

• Immersion and flow-coating method
• Spray coating methods
• Health hazards for human operators
• Fumes and mist in the air
• Noise from the nozzle
• Fire hazards
• Potential cancer hazards
• Robots in Spray painting
• Spray gun is the robot’s end effector
• Requirements
• Continuous path control
• Hydraullic drive
• Manual lead through programming
• Multiple program storage
• Challenges for robots in spray painting
• Control over the operation of the spray gun system
• Apart from on-off control, important process variables such as paint flow
rate, fluid or air pressure, atomization should be taken care
• Parameters related to coating fluid such as viscosity, specific gravity,
temperature must be maintained consistently through out
• Periodic cleaning of spray gun
• Benefits of Robot spray coating
• Removal of operators from the hazardous environment
• Lower energy consumption
• Consistency of finish
• Reduced coating material usage
• Greater productivity
Assembly and Inspection Operation

• Assembly means fitting together of two or more discrete parts to

form a new component

• Three categories in assembly

• Parts presentation method
• Assembly tasks
• Assembly cell design

• Parts presentation methods

• Parts located within a specific area (parts not positioned or oriented)
• Parts located at a known position (parts not oriented)
• Parts located in a known position and orientation
• Parts presentation methods
• Bowl feeders
• Magazine feeders
• Trays and pallets
• Assembly operations
• Parts mating-parts or components (two or more) are brought in contact with each
other.
• Parts joining- parts or components (two or more) are mated and then additional
steps are taken to ensure that the parts will maintain their relationship with each
other.
• Parts mating
• Peg-in-hole: insertion of one part (the peg) into another part.
• Hole-on-peg:
• Multiple peg-in-hole
• Stacking: several component are placed once on top of the next, with no pins or
other devices for locating the parts relative to each other.
• Parts-Joining Tasks
• Fastening screws
• Retainers
• Press fits
• Snap fits
• Welding and related joining method
• Adhesives
• Crimping
• Sewing
 Inspection Automation

• Inspection is a quality control operation that involves the checking of

parts, assemblies, or products.
• Three categories of robotic inspection systems:
• Vision inspection systems
• Robot manipulation inspection
• Robot loaded test equipment

VII Semester, 2022-23, Department of Mechanical Engineering, SIT

 Thank you

Department of Mechanical Engineering, SIT