Robot cell uses vision system to accurately locate individual wheel covers and palletize them into plastic totes using nested stacking patterns. System easily achieves required palletizing rate of 240 per hour (15 seconds/part) and can run production for 30-60 minutes unattended. Robot improves productivity and provides highly reliable operation.
Project Challenges
- Provide robotic system to accurately palletize a variety of plastic wheel covers ranging in size from 381 mm (15.0") to 533 mm (21.0") that weigh up to 1 kg (2.2 lbs) each into plastic totes in proper orientation. Totes are 1,638 mm L x 1,219 mm W x 623 mm H (64.5" L x 48" W x 24.5" H) within ±3.175 mm (0.125") and tote weight is 45.4 kg (100 lbs).
- System must be capable of palletizing wheel covers from an infeed conveyor at a rate of 240 per hour (15 seconds/part). Wheel cover stacking patterns will be 2 L x 2 W x 17 H or 3 L x 2 W x 17 H. No divider stacks are used between layers.
- Improve productivity and provide reliable operation.
Motoman Robotics Solution
Motoman Robotics provided an HP50 wheel handling system, including:
- Motoman HP50 robot with NX100 controller.
- Additional XOI01 Discrete I/O Module
- DeviceNet fieldbus board.
- Robot base riser.
- Custom end of arm tool – mechanical gripper.
- Wheel cover infeed conveyor – 3.0 m (12') overall length, 610 mm (24") wide clear belt with four accumulation zones. Adjustable supports for 457 mm (18") TOR Elevation and fixed end stop at discharge end. Speed of 18.3 m (60') per minute.
- Vision system locates X and Y position of backlit wheel covers on infeed conveyor and also uses five lug holes in each part to determine radial orientation. Includes high-performance digital camera, lighting and PC mounted on stands, as well as vision spreadsheet interface, mounting hardware and robot interface cable.
- Tote outfeed conveyor (Customer supplied). Chain-driven live-roller (CDLR) type is approximately 4.88-m (16') L x 1.3-m (51") W.
- Three-color status beacon.
- Cell guarding package that meets ANSI/RIA R15.06-1999 standard, including 2.44 m (8') H woven wire perimeter safety fence, one access gate with positive-break safety switch, and dual-channel safety hardware for access gate.
Fixtures/Tooling Details
Motoman Robotics provided a custom end-of-arm tool, a mechanical gripper designed to handle one wheel cover at a time by the outside diameter (OD) of the part. Gripper includes part present, full open and full close sensors.
Ref: ACS-090