Tasks and processes that can be automated with collaborative robots

Assembly

Assembly can involve a variety of processes, including screwing, mounting, fastening, connecting and other handling tasks for parts and sub-assemblies. By performing various manipulations such as transferring and inserting objects, a collaborative robot can quickly and accurately assemble parts. These include mechanical, pneumatic and electronic assemblies.

Palletizing

Palletizing involves stacking loads on different trays or other loading devices for storage or transportation. 

When equipped with end-effectors compatible with the loads to be palletized, cobots can perform this task, which is often a source of injury, material damage, forgetfulness and other factors with negative consequences for productivity. Compatibility between end effector and load to be palletized depends, among other things, on the material, porosity, mass and size of the materials to be handled.

The ability of collaborative robots to perform repetitive and precise tasks is a clear demonstration of their usefulness in such a process.

Welding

Welding tasks are many and varied, and can be found in a wide range of industries (electronic components, joining assembly parts with weld beads, equipment maintenance, additive manufacturing, etc.). Of course, some types of welding lend themselves better to automation.

The advantages of automating this process include repeatability and consistency of welds, low wastage of fusible electrodes (consumables), little reprocessing and rework, and rapid arrival of processed units on the market.

Screws

Generally considered a sub-task of assembly, screwing is a very common task on production lines. Once again, since they are generally equipped with torque and force control functions, cobots enable screwing to be carried out with unrivalled precision. Since the parameters are exactly the same for a given task, the process is reliable and the results consistent. When it comes to compatibility, everything depends on the screwdriving end effector used and the fastening elements employed.

Machine feeding and machining

Although the official equivalence of the term machine tending is "machine monitoring", it's more a question offeeding, loading and unloading machines. We're talking here about lathes, milling machines and other CNC machining equipment. Rather than employing one or more workers to keep these machines running continuously, manufacturers today have access to a number of robotic solutions to perform a range of repetitive tasks.

• Opening the machine door
• Loading and positioning of raw parts
• Actuating the clamping device
• Closing the machine door
• Machine start-up
• Reopening the machine door
• Unloading the machined part
• Cleaning of machine and clamping device, if necessary
• Reading signals (vision system, input/output, robot program)

Finishing, deburring, polishing

These surface treatment processes often depend on qualities that are difficult to achieve by manual workers, even when equipped with task-specific power tools: uniformity, consistency and repeatability. Given their quarter-turn adjustable programmingprogramming their ability to follow ultra-precise trajectories, taking all axes into consideration and the advantages provided by torque and force control functionsWhen it comes to automating surface treatment, collaborative robots are the obvious choice.

Inspection and quality control

Inspection and quality control tasks are numerous: calibration, sizing, tolerancing, testing of printed circuit boards, chips, tactile functions, buttons, interfaces, and so on. Generally speaking, companies that assign human resources to such repetitive work would benefit from reallocating these people to higher value-added tasks. Cobots, with their logic and signal interpretation, are specially designed for inspection and quality control processes.

Removal of adhesives and other materials

Here's another task that requires exemplary consistency in execution: quantity of material to be deposited, speed of movement and trajectory to be respected. Although manual workers put all their willpower into achieving uniform results, they are generally prone to fatigue, errors, absenteeism and much more. This makes collaborative robots ideal for the repeatable application of semi-liquid substances in a wide range of industries, such as assembly, dispensing and caulking.

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