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Collaborative robots are having a profound impact on industrial manufacturing. Robots are taking over the world. Some countries are so concerned with rapid robot expansion that there’s been discussion of a robot employment tax to countermand the displacement of workers caused by robot implementations. Chinese appliance maker, Midea, riding the momentum of its $4 billion acquisition of Kuka, intends to fend off Japanese competitors and dominate the world’s largest robot market.
There’s a lot at stake. With the rise and convergence of the Industrial Internet of Things and collaborative robot applications, the possibilities are endless. And a sure sign of the times was Schunk’s collaborative robot gripper, with embedded intelligence and two cameras, winning the Hermes Award at Hannover Messe 2017.
The sky’s the limit on robotic industrial applications. We asked a variety of industry experts some specific questions about where robots are headed and how they plan to get there.
Industry is abuzz with collaborative robots, but is it the robot or the application that is collaborative? And what is the difference between a robot that can operate uncaged to collaborate with humans and one that can’t? Is there a downside to installing a collaborative robot when the application doesn’t call for one?
It’s also critical for risk assessment to be done from the perspective of the system. Even when using a robot designed for collaborative use, safety standards require companies to complete a risk assessment and mitigate any risks identified in the system.
The best way for people to ensure they are following safe practices is for them to get their arms around the collaborative supplement, TS 15066, to the overall safety standard, ISO 10218. Of course, companies need to remember that the effective use of TS 15066 assumes that the robot system under consideration is in compliance with Part 1 and Part 2 of ISO 10218:2011.
Carole Franklin is director of standards development at Robotic Industries Association (RIA).
Bob Rochelle, Güdel: The collaborative robot is required in the application where collaboration is required. The difference in the uncaged to caged robots is in compliance to the safety-rated requirement for the control system to allow a safe stop. And in some cases the manufacturer uses very low-wattage motors so they stall out when the robot encounters an obstruction. Hence it stops when it hits something. Many of the collaborative robots do not allow the higher speeds of the standard, caged robot, and in some instances these are not as repeatable or precise as the caged design. To use the caged style robot in a collaborative system requires the use of the safety-rated speed and separation technology to allow the robot to slow and stop as the hazard, the human, approaches. The downside to using these uncaged technologies in an application that does not call for it is a sacrifice in speed of operation and precision.
Bob Rochelle is logistics market specialist/area sales manager at Güdel.
Ryan Guthrie is executive vice president at TM Robotics.
Matthew Bush is COO and co-founder at Hirebotics.
Maximiliano Falcone, Kawasaki Robotics USA: We receive calls from customers for our new duAro robot. They perceive a collaborative robot as an easy way to get into robotics. In reality, there is in some ways actually a lot more to consider when integrating a collaborative than with its non-collaborative brethren. Within the collaborative standard there are many factors that need to be considered that the robot cannot exceed or be able to detect while running. For this work, these robots run much slower than what a non-collaborative robot would run within a fenced-in cell doing the same application. However, at the end of the day, the thing that will decide if a collaborative robot can be deployed in an application is the risk assessment.
The application needs to be proven to be collaborative through the risk assessment. The robot needs to run within the parameter sets which allow the stamp of “collaborative approval” to be put on the application itself. By not completing a risk assessment and verifying that the robot meets the parameters set forth by the standard, certain liberties are being taken, which cost dearly in the form of injury or loss of life.
Putting a robot in an application for the sake of putting a robot in is counterproductive. Collaborative, for the moment, to some means “slow and safe.” One must really consider what is the value of deploying a collaborative robot in a manufacturing environment? Saving on fencing in most cases will not make or break a return-on-investment (ROI) calculation. There needs to be other factors which make deploying the robot make sense. Interaction with human co-workers and a perceived flexibility are currently the hottest items causing companies to look into collaborative robots; however, if the application doesn’t pass the risk assessment, then it should not be collaborative.
Maximiliano Falcone is senior manager, general industries engineering at Kawasaki Robotics USA.
Patrick Laughter is engineering manager, robotics, Denso Products & Services Americas.
Brian Carlisle is CEO at Precise Automation.
Travis Schneider, Parker Hannifin: The robot is enabled to be collaborative, but in my opinion the application should be conducive to a collaboration between worker and robot for a customer to take full advantage of the robot. Collaborative robots often operate at reduced speed or payload to minimize the potential pain or injury it could do to a human. Nevertheless, the application must be scrutinized against risk assessments that act as general guides to ensure safe performance. Even when operating at reduced payloads or speeds, if the collaborative robot is wielding a knife or needle, it could still likely inflict a lot of harm to an unsuspecting passerby.
Most applications for robots fall into one of the three Ds of dull, dirty or dangerous—of these, the dull or mundane operations are probably some of the best targets for collaborative robotics. However, if a robotic operation is to be performed away from people or, more importantly, can keep the human away from a dirty or dangerous operation, then a “standard” industrial robot may be a better option as it won't have speed or payload limitations. This is especially true when one is automating a process to make large throughput gains. Another general guide to keep in mind is to use the right tool for the right job. In the same way that not every application requires a collaborative robot, not every application requires a six-axis arm. There are tons of different configurations for robotic manipulation. I often try to guide engineers to deploy the right number of degrees of freedom for what the application requires. In addition to potentially being less expensive, constraining the motion to the proper number of degrees of freedom can actually provide a higher degree of precision in motion.
An uncaged industrial robot requires an extensive amount of sensing—LIDAR, infrared—and control integration, and it is likely cost-prohibitive. However, as the cost of sensors continues to fall, this will likely be a viable collaborative method.
The only downside I could see would be throughput or payload limitations, as mentioned. This is again assuming the application requires a six-axis operation. , Going back to my earlier comment, in using the right degrees of freedom for the application, a lower-degree-of-freedom system could be more precise, smaller and less expensive than a collaborative robot.
Travis Schneider is IoT business development, automation group at Parker Hannifin.
Mike Van Hoomissen is senior staff software engineer at DWFritz Automation.
Andie Zhang is global product manager, collaborative robotics at ABB.
Daniel Moore, Universal Robots: As the industry leader in collaborative robotics, we acknowledge that it is the application that is collaborative, but you need collaborative systems to build that application. There are four types of collaborative devices, but we consider the highest and most difficult standard, permanent force- and power-limited devices, to be true “cobots.” Most industrial robots are so strong and so massive and so insensitive to outside forces that there is no chance to avoid catastrophe in the event of a high-speed collision, regardless of the type of payload. A true collaborative robot in an assessed collaborative application should be able to move at high speeds without endangering nearby humans.
Now, traditional industrial robots will always have the advantage in speed and payload capacity, but we believe one of the main selling points of Universal Robots is ease-of-use and redeployability; even if a line is shut down, that robot can be easily unmounted and moved by hand to a new spot and quickly be reprogrammed to continue producing profit for the owner.
Daniel Moore is tech support manager at Universal Robots.
Bhaskar Ramakrishnan is technical sales engineer at DWFritz Automation.
Jim Lawton is chief product and marketing officer at Rethink Robotics.
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Mike Bacidore is the editor in chief for Control Design magazine. He is an award-winning columnist, earning a Gold Regional Award and a Silver National Award from the American Society of Business Publication Editors. Email him at [email protected].