DoF - a Robotiq Community
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Samuel_Bouchard

@Albert could you advise?

RM_Chahe

@Sebastien

As you mentioned, industrial robots commit to repeatability specifications and not absolute positional accuracy.  For milling with robots, in addition to positional accuracy, other success factors would include speed independent motion accuracy and depending on the hardness of the material rigidity could also be a factor.  We have had good success with a variety of Fanuc robots, the workspace and rigidity requirements will influence the specific model of arm that can be used.  Once the exact model is determined calibration and accurate setup of user frame and tool TCP are necessary for good results.  If your application requires very long programs (ex: milling of molds) then you will need one additional item and that is a communications setup that can handle large programs.  One approach that we use is to break a large program into smaller sub-programs and manage the loading/unloading of smaller sub-programs to ensure a smooth playback and optimal milling results despite robot controller limitations.  We have conducted milling tests with UR5 and UR10 arms also.  Collaborative robots have worked well for tasks such as trimming, however for milling we have discovered that there currently are some hurdles that need to be overcome.  For UR robots the manufacturer recommends using SCRIPT files for milling programs.  During our testing we discovered that the maximum program length that a UR robot would load was about 20,000 points and a program of that length took over 30 minutes to load.  Universal Robots will be working on enhancing SCRIPT files for the future, however low payload is another factor that is prohibitive to using UR arms for milling unless the material is very soft (foam, low density resin, etc...).