The traditional image of industrial robots is one of hulking cast iron arms welding an automotive body-in-white behind high safety fences.
These robots, and the engineers who program them, aim to shave fractions of a second from cycle times, and this specific purpose explains why these machines evolved into their current form in the automotive manufacturing environment.
But robots can be so much more!
With collaborative robots, or cobots, all that guarding, cast iron, and complex programming is unnecessary. Safety features such as torque-sensing actuators and pressure-sensitive skins allow human operators to work alongside cobots, unleashing their potential on virtually any process on the shop floor.
However, deploying a new robotic cell can be challenging.
The high up-front cost is one barrier, and complex programming and process design is another. Many manufacturing managers want a ‘set it and forget it’ solution, but according to Robotiq CEO Samuel Bouchard, that’s not the best option.
Your factory floor is a living thing, and nobody knows the manufacturing ins and outs better than you. Having the capability in-house to deploy and reconfigure your robotic cell is invaluable when it comes time to make new parts or change processes.
We spoke to Samuel Bouchard at this year’s Robotiq User Conference (RUC).
Stay tuned for more videos from the event here on ENGINEERING.com.