Move robot inside camera image edge

Rolf 2017-03-26

Hi,

Would want to automate gluing process for foam pieces that are of random size and shape.

Idea is to place manualy pieces on a conveior.

Take photo with camera, identify the shape and place of the piece.

All pieces are 2-dimentional so the height of the piece is not an issue.

Then to move the robot so that inside of the piece gets applied with glue.

Can UR + camera acheave this ?

Vincent_Paquin 2017-03-26

Hi, I am not sure what you mean by "random size and shape". Do you mean that the system will never see twice the same piece or that each production lot will have its own set of shapes and sizes?

Actually Robotiq's vision system only allows you to work with pieces that you can teach. It won't work with something it never saw.

Rolf 2017-03-27

With "random size and shape" I mean that there are several thousend of different pieces, so teaching them would be a huge task.
There is a lot of similarities, ex hundreds of different type of rectangular.. that only differ by the mesurement.

matthewd92 2017-03-27

You could look at some of the other industrial cameras such as provided by SICK, Cognex or Microscan. I know SICK offers a URCap. You might be able to teach a blob to them that could then be used to find different shapes so long as the basic area of pixels is similar, so you might still need to teach some objects but not everyone. With a blob the camera would return the centroid which is the center of rotation of the blob that it sees.

Student 2017-03-27

You can use a camera from Cognex and the software In-Sight Explorer (see PatMax functions).

Vincent_Paquin 2017-03-27

I am not sure that a tool like PatMax would be the approproate choice since, as far as I know, the patterns also need to be teached. I agree with matthewd92, you need a blob or an edge tool. Along with that you will need to select your work plane carefully and maintain a constant illumination.

You should also have a look to Matrox products. They offer a smart camera and a graphical development environment.

Rolf 2017-03-27

Thank you for the hints.
Unfortunately the integration part goes beond my skills.
Could somebody recomend an integration partner for such aplication ?

matthewd92 2017-03-27

Where are you located?

Rolf 2017-03-27

Estonia, so a partner preferably in Baltics or Scandinavia or Northern Europe.

rkeener 2017-03-30

Perhaps the opposite... What if the robot loaded the conveyor and the human operator applied the glue? Still only one operator and one robot.

tylermartin 2017-03-30

Would a robot holding a glue gun be considered safe enough to be left in the open as a collaborative robot? We had a project that was in the planning with a UR and a hot glue, the only difference is that it was a standard part that could be easily taught.

matthewd92 2017-03-30

@Tylermartin I'd say it depends on the type of glue gun, hot glue I'd agree and say that you'd need some sort of safety to prevent a user from getting burned. A cold glue such as two part epoxy I wouldn't see a risk unless from some sort of puncture from a fine tip or the likes.

We've done gluing in the open without issue.