A Canadian furnishings producer has automated a historically labor-intensive upholstery course of utilizing a robotic work cell constructed round a Fanuc M-710iC industrial robotic.
Developed by Fanuc Licensed System Integrator Dvolu, the automated upholstery cell performs a collection of duties which have traditionally required expert human employees, together with cloth stretching, stapling, trimming, and palletizing chair seat linings.
The venture highlights how robotics is more and more shifting past conventional manufacturing functions resembling welding, machine tending, and materials dealing with into duties that require a better diploma of dexterity and flexibility.
In accordance with Dvolu, the system makes use of machine imaginative and prescient to establish the precise place and orientation of seat cushions on pallets earlier than the robotic picks, positions, stretches, staples, trims, and palletizes the completed elements.
By combining imaginative and prescient steering, robotic dealing with, and laser trimming in a single built-in cell, the system can adapt to half variations with out guide adjustment.
One of many major objectives of the venture was to deal with labor shortages affecting furnishings producers, notably in jobs that contain repetitive, high-volume guide meeting.
Dvolu says the cell offers “tangible labor aid” by automating one of many trade’s most tough positions to recruit and retain employees for.
The corporate described the venture as a big technical achievement because of the challenges related to dealing with versatile supplies.
“Actually pleased with this venture,” Dvolu stated in a response to a Fanuc LinkedIn post in regards to the robotic work cell. “Upholstery automation is genuinely onerous: cloth habits, half variability, cycle time constraints, and the Fanuc M-710iC delivered on all fronts. Glad to have helped our shopper convey consistency and aid to one among their hardest manufacturing challenges. Thanks for the shoutout, Fanuc!”
The system is constructed round Fanuc’s M-710 Collection robotic, a household of medium-payload robots able to dealing with masses starting from 12 kg to 70 kg. The robots function a slim wrist design, high-axis speeds, and a attain of as much as 3.1 meters.
Whereas industrial robots have lengthy been utilized in furnishings manufacturing for duties resembling materials dealing with and machining, upholstery has remained a difficult course of to automate as a result of materials can stretch, wrinkle, and behave unpredictably.
The profitable deployment means that advances in robotics, machine imaginative and prescient, and automatic dealing with are starting to make even extremely variable manufacturing processes appropriate for automation.
