THE ROBOT REPORT_DESIGN WORLD_FEBRUARY 2020

A Supplement to Design World - February 2020 www.designworldonline.com

Grippers:

Advancing telerobotics through tactile feedback

page 50

INSIDE: • ‘Active perception’ a novel approach to robotic grasping................................................58 • Flexible gripper handles dozens of parts for manufacturer...............................................62 • Force torque sensor shines in robotic glass polishing .................................................68 • Four trends in end-of-arm tooling ...............72

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The Robot Report

How Converge Robotics Group

plans to advance telerobotics through tactile feedback

Keith Shaw

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Successful demonstrations of concept provide for further collaboration between three companies.

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Tangible Research, part of the new Converge Robotics Group, drew large crowds at CES 2020 with demonstrations of the Tactile Telerobot system. | Credit: Tangible Research Inc. THE ROBOT REPORT

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The Robot Report

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At re:MARS 2019, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos described the Tactile Telerobot demonstration as 'really impressive.' | Converge Robotics Group

A big “thumbs up” om Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, along with other successful demonstrations at technology events, have propelled a collaboration in tactile feedback for telerobotics operation into a more formal endeavor.

Converge Robotics Group, a consortium of Shadow Robot Company, HaptX, and Tangible Research, was launched at CES 2020 with the goal of integrating technologies into systems that allow an operator to control robotic equipment through natural user interfaces. The companies will share resources and collaborate toward a goal of advancing telepresence, telerobotics, and haptics.

The group’s Tactile Telerobot is a teleoperated system that allows an operator to precisely control robotic hands, which then transmit a sense of touch back to the operator’s hands through haptic gloves.

At Amazon’s re:MARS event in June 2019, Bezos walked by the group’s booth on the expo floor and asked to try out the system. His responses, which described the experience as “really impressive” and “the tactile feedback is tremendous,” made headlines around the world.

Since that demonstration, Converge Robotics Group launched the robot publicly at CEATEC 2019 in Japan in October 2019. The group participated in the CEATEC Society 5.0 TOWN exhibition, which showcased futuristic robot technology with the theme “A City in 2030.”

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The Tactile Telerobot integrates several advanced robotic components in order to create the experience, including the following: • HaptX Gloves, which capture hand motion with precision, providing realistic tactile and force feedback.

• Shadow Robot’s anthropomorphic Shadow Dexterous Hand, which mimics human motion with 24 degrees of eedom.

• SynTouch’s biometrics sensors, which capture force, temperature, pressure, and vibration with equal resolution to a human finger.

• Two Universal Robots UR10 cobots, one for each “arm” of the system.

An operator wearing the haptic gloves can control the robot hands at a distance, whether in the same room, another room, or even another location.

The robot hands will then mimic the operator’s hand and arm movements, handling materials and completing tasks.

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More than a typical teleoperated robot, the Tactile Telerobot provides feedback to an operator through hand sensors on the robot hands and haptic gloves worn by the user. This feedback allows for greater robot manipulation for tasks such as cup stacking, bottle cap opening, and Rubik’s cube rotation. These tasks are difficult to do through autonomy or artificial intelligence software.

(All photos courtesy of Converge Robotics Group)

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The Robot Report

Andrew Mitrak, HaptX

Rich Walker, Shadow Robot

Jeremy Fishel, Tangible Research

Sensors on the robot hands then relay touch sensations back to the operator’s gloves, so they can feel what the robot hands are touching.

At the re:MARS event, demonstrations included operators being able to stack plastic cups, manipulate a Rubik’s Cube, and pick up and flip a playing card sitting on a table.

At CEATEC, Converge Robotics demonstrated different scenarios in its “City in 2030” display, including:

• A kitchen scenario, which demonstrated how robot hands can master the fine motions necessary to prepare meals and pour drinks into a cup from a bottle.

• A school scenario, which used the platform to communicate with participants while moving around a classroom.

• A fish-market scenario, which demonstrated how to fish remotely from Tokyo using an avatar robot installed at a fishing pole pond in Oita on the island of Kyushu. In the future, ANA said it plans to deliver all of the fish caught using the avatar technology to the operator’s home directly from Oita.

• A mobility scenario, in which participants could remotely view and shop at museums around the world. This scenario showcased ways to make it easier for the elderly and people living with disabilities to enjoy outdoor activities and experience local attractions.

• A laboratory scenario, which used avatars to showcase technology that allows people to perform advanced activities such as climbing stairs or selecting the most efficient walking tasks.

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The collaboration was started with support and funding from ANA Holdings, a Japanese airline that was looking to create an avatar-like experience for its customers that want to travel to other locations and do “virtual tourism” without leaving their homes.

ANA is also sponsoring the ANA Avatar XPRIZE, a global competition focused on developing a robotic avatar system that transfers an operator’s senses, actions, and presence to a remote location in real time. The competition recently announced 77 teams for the semi-finals, which will be held in 2021.

The final 20 teams are expected to compete in 2022 for the $10 million prize.

The Converge group was initially considering competing in the XPRIZE, but felt that since it had already received some funding from ANA to develop the Tactile Telerobot, it would be a conflict of interest. However, officials from the group said they are very familiar with several of the teams competing, and may become a supplier or advisor to XPRIZE teams.

Because of the success of these early demonstrations, the group felt that a more formal designation was required in order to advance commercialization of the Tactile Telerobot.

“We needed a cohesive brand around this, because some people were saying it was the HaptX robot, or the Shadow Robot, or the Tangible robot, the ANA robot, or even the Jeff Bezos robot,” said Andrew Mitrak, director of marketing at HaptX. “Converge is a name that illustrates how multiple different pieces of technology coming together can create a whole that is bigger than the sum of the parts, and its own entity.”

Mitrak said, however, that the group is still a collaboration, and not a formal company. The individual companies can still operate their own businesses, but the group mutually benefits from the Tactile Telerobot system.

“From a business perspective, we’re trying to understand the market potential before we commit to something that would detract from what each of us are doing individually,” said Jeremy Fishel, Ph.D., the founder of Tangible Research and a scientific advisor at SynTouch. “We’re also looking at an informal consortium agreement on how we collaborate together, but a formal

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“Our system is being all about being natural and intuitive,” said Andrew Mitrak, seen here practicing with the telerobot.

entity would need to be justified by either a large market opportunity or an investment that would require us to have more structure.”

The group is actively seeking hardware partners, project sponsors, and early access customers. It has had discussions with companies looking to fund further research and development, Fishel said.

In the meantime, work continues to improve technology features on the system, which includes improving the network connectivity and reducing latency for the teleoperation, as well as improving visual systems so operators can better see the robotic hands when using them.

Currently, the system uses two cameras pointed at the robotic hands, one with a spatial view and one with a depth view.

“An operator has to look at two different cameras to manipulate his or her hands in space, and it requires a lot of cognitive workload,” said Mitrak.

“Our system is all about being natural and intuitive, so we’re looking at more immersive-style displays – maybe it’s AR or VR, or some other kind of emerging technology that has a sense of depth and space, to improve the telepresence and teleoperation.”

Mitrak said the group would also benefit from collaborators in telecommunications, 5G, and networking, since telerobotics requires the transmission of high-bandwidth data over reliable networks at low latency.

“The big picture vision is that we effectively want it to feel exactly like your hands as much as possible in an economically affordable situation for all the places you might want to use it,” said Fishel. “We’re hoping that we can fund the R&D that improves the system capabilities

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and ultimately reduces the costs through more of the high-risk applications first.”

Examples of environments where telerobotics can thrive include the nuclear industry, where it’s very expensive and dangerous to decommission nuclear reactors, or in space, where it’s expensive to send humans.

Shadow Robot, in particular, is focused on incorporating the technology in radioactive environments and solving industry challenges via remote handling in glove boxes. The company is looking at the following operations: • The Tactile Telerobot is set up at a glove box, and the Shadow Hand component is inserted into existing glove ports.

• An operator wears a haptic glove, which allows them to control the Shadow Hand at a safe distance, even in another room or location.

• The robot mimics the operator’s hand and arm movements, handling hazardous materials. The touch feedback, if preferred, can allow the operator to feel what they’re handling for better accuracy.

Benefits of this approach include zero exposure to workers, more operational hours, eliminating restrictive personal protective equipment, and reducing the cost of significant secondary waste, Shadow said.

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Converge Robotics Group is also looking at additional environments, including deep sea, oil and gas, and bomb disposal situations, as well as less-dangerous environments such as clean rooms in pharmaceutical companies.

“If you said what do you want to be able to do with a teleoperation system, my answer would be pretty simple, and that’s anything that a person with gloves can do,” said Rich Walker, managing director of the Shadow Robot Company. “If I can do that, then there’s a wide range of problems that are worth solving that we can put that robot to work solving. If it can’t do the same set of things a person with gloves can do, then it’s not good enough yet, so we have to improve it. So that’s been our focus.”

The group’s members said they enjoy the reactions of people when they first try out the system, and have speculated on why operators get so excited.

“It’s getting that feedback, and it connects you with the robot in a different kind of way that just wasn’t possible before,” said Fishel. “We’ve said many times that we’ve been making terrible mistakes by not videotaping everyone’s first reaction when you squeeze their finger. They get the gloves, they play with the robot hands, and then you squeeze the robot finger and they feel it, and everyone’s faces light up. Some people have amazingly wonderful expressions when that happens, and it’s a special connection that maybe just didn’t exist before.”

“There’s all of these doomsday scenarios about robotics, and this is the exact opposite of that – we’re saying, ‘No, we’re in control of robotics,’ “ said HaptX’s Mitrak.

“We’re creating robots in our own image, and they are following us, matching our senses and augmenting us. It’s something that is so empowering. When you see somebody like Jeff Bezos or anybody at CES who had a chance to try it, they love it because they feel so empowered by it and they see this magic, and they see this massive general potential for it.” RR

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‘Active perception’ a novel approach to robotic grasping

What do popular games like Jenga and Pick Up Sticks have in

common with training a robot to grasp and manipulate objects in the real world? The answer can be found in an “active perception” project at the Australian Centre for Robotic Vision that examines the complex task of visual grasp detection in real-world clutter.

“The idea behind it is actually quite simple,” said Ph.D. researcher Doug Morrison, who created an open-source GG-CNN network enabling robots to more accurately and quickly grasp moving objects in cluttered spaces. “Our aim at the Centre is to create truly useful robots able to see and understand like humans. So, in this project, instead of a robot looking and thinking about how best to grasp objects om clutter while at a standstill, we decided to help it move and think at the same time.”

“A good analogy is how we humans play games like Jenga or Pick Up Sticks,” he said. “We don’t sit still, stare, think, and then close our eyes and blindly grasp at objects to win a game. We move and crane our heads around, looking for the easiest target to pick up om a pile.”

The Robot Report Staff

Stepping away om a static camera The project’s active perception approach focuses on real-time grasping by stepping away om a static camera position or fixed data collecting routines.

It is also unique in the way it builds up a map of grasps in a pile of objects, which continually updates as the robot moves. This real-time mapping predicts the quality and pose of grasps at every pixel in a depth image, all at a speed fast enough for closed-loop control at up to 30Hz.

Researcher Doug Morrison checks the 3D printed fingers for the end effector on the Franka Emika Panda robot. | Credit: Australian Centre for Robotic Vision 58

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The Robot Report The Multi-View Picking Controller considers multiple informative viewpoints for an eye-in-hand camera while reaching for a grasp in clutter to reduce uncertainty in the grasp pose estimate caused by clutter and occlusions. This allows it to perform highquality grasps that may not be clearly visible from the initial viewpoint. | Credit: Australian Centre for Robotic Vision

The project’s active perception approach focuses on real-time grasping by stepping away from a static camera position or fixed data collecting routines.

“The beauty of our active perception approach is that it’s smarter and at least 10 times faster than static, single viewpoint grasp detection methods,” Morrison said. “We strip out lost time by making the act of reaching towards an object a meaningful part of the grasping pipeline rather than just a mechanical necessity.

“Like humans, this allows the robot to change its mind on the go in order to select the best object to grasp and remove from a messy pile of others,” he added.

Morrison has tested and validated his active perception approach at the center’s laboratory at Queensland University of

Technology (QUT). Trials involved using a robotic arm to “tidy up” 20 objects, one at a time, from a pile of clutter. His approach achieved an 80% success rate when grasping in clutter; more than 12% better than traditional single-viewpoint graspdetection methods.

Morrison said he was especially proud of developing the Multi-View Picking (MVP) controller, which selects multiple informative viewpoints for an eye-inhand camera while reaching to a grasp, revealing high-quality grasps hidden from a static viewpoint.

“Our approach directly uses entropy in the grasp pose estimation to influence control, which means that by looking at a pile of objects from multiple viewpoints on the move, a robot is able to reduce uncertainty caused by clutter and occlusions,” said Morrison. “It also feeds into safety and efficiency by enabling a robot to know what it can and can’t grasp effectively. This is important in the real world, particularly if items are breakable, like glass or china tableware messily stacked in a washing-up tray with other household items.”

The next step for Morrison, as part of the center’s “Grasping With Intent” project funded by a $70,000 Amazon Research Award, is moving from safe and effective grasping into the realm of meaningful vision-guided robotic manipulation.

“In other words, we want a robot to not only grasp an object, but do something with it; basically, to usefully perform a

From left to right: The position of the robot (and camera); the collection of objects being grasped; the depth image captured from the current pose pt; the quality output of the GG-CNN (Q); the average quality at each grid cell (q ̄); the entropy at every grid cell (H); the utility of a viewpoint (U) above each cell in the workspace, from which the velocity command v is calculated, and the traversed path superimposed in blue. (b) The histograms mj,k and qj,k which represent the counts of observations at, from left to right, grid cells with the best estimated grasp pose, a flat surface with low entropy and, a highly occluded area which results in a high measurement entropy.

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task in the real world,” he said. “Take for example, setting a table, stacking a dishwasher, or safely placing items on a shelf without them rolling or falling off.”

Active perception and adversarial shapes Morrison has also set his sights on fasttracking how a robot actually learns to grasp physical objects. Instead of using typical household items, he said he wants to create a truly challenging training data set of adversarial shapes.

“It’s funny because some of the objects we’re looking to develop in simulation could better belong in a futuristic science fiction movie or alien world — and definitely not anything humans would use on planet Earth!” said Morrison.

There is, however, a method in this scientific madness. Training robots to grasp items designed for people is not efficient or beneficial for a robot.

“At first glance, a stack of ‘human’ household items might look like a diverse data set, but most are pretty much the same,” Morrison explained. “For example cups, jugs, flashlights and many other objects all have handles, which are grasped in the same way and do not demonstrate difference or diversity in a data set.”

“We’re exploring how to put evolutionary algorithms to work to create new, weird, diverse and different shapes that can be tested in simulation and also 3D printed,” he said. “A robot won’t get smarter by learning to grasp similar shapes. A crazy, out-of-this world data set of shapes will enable robots to quickly and efficiently grasp anything they encounter in the real world.” RR

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Case Study

Flexible gripper handles dozens of parts for manufacturer Steve Crowe • Editor • The Robot Report

Tomenson Machine Works is a third-generation, family-owned manufacturer of precision hydraulic manifolds used in a variety of machinery across the agricultural, mining, and construction industries. Founded in 1977 by Thomas Roake, the Chicago-based company has become a world leader in hydraulic manifolds with the products now considered a “gold standard” in the industry.

The company turned to automation for its pin stamping application to improve quality, profitability, and worker satisfaction. An OnRobot RG6 gripper and Universal Robots UR3 cobot handle dozens of part sizes. They enable Tomenson to automate potential applications such as machine tending, deburring, and packaging.

Challenges When Tomenson looked at repetitive tasks ripe for automation, the task of placing parts in a pin stamper for engraving was low-hanging uit. It was having difficulty finding employees to staff this station.

“Operating the engraver is tedious. It’s not something people go by and say, ‘Yay, I’m going to go run the engraver for eight hours,’” said Geoffrey Rose, secondary operations lead and quality supervisor at Tomenson.

This was Tomenson’s first foray into automation, and it needed a flexible gripper that could handle parts that go through the pin stamper. “No one in the company had ever dealt with collaborative robots or anything of this manner, especially not Geoffrey, who’s doing the programming every day and running the system,” said Tomenson operations manager Alex Roake.

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Solution Tomenson chose OnRobot’s RG6 gripper because it could handle the variety of parts without extra programming or machining of extra end effectors.

“As soon as you plug the RG6 in, it works. Programming the pin stamper is actually much harder than programming the gripper,” said Alex Roake. “For the entire system, it took us maybe a couple of weeks, but for the gripper specifically, less than a day.”

The pin stamping application requires the gripper to handle as many as 30 different parts. Programming a new part now takes as little as five to 10 minutes since the robot can use the same basic code for every part and the gripper senses when it grasps the part, no matter what size it is.

Brian Einzig, automation specialist with FPE Automation, advised Tomenson on the system. “Whereas we normally see the one gripper, one part, we now see the flexibility that OnRobot’s grippers offer customers. It’s a customized tool out of the box,” he said. “Before they were using maybe a two-jaw gripper for one part and a three-jaw gripper for another part, now we’re seeing the RG6 can do multiple parts for multiple jobs.”

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Tomenson Machine Works uses OnRobot’s RG6 gripper and Universal Robots UR3 cobot to automate the placing of parts in a pin stamper.

This has freed up one operator per shift, who is now reallocated to more value-added tasks. | Credit: OnRobot

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Case Study “We knew we were not going to get a gripper and robot that might need safety guarding because we’re working in a tight environment in the cell,” said Tomenson operations manager Alex Roake. “The collaborative aspect was one of the main factors in how we picked out the gripper and the robotic system.” | Credit: OnRobot

The company turned to automation for its pin stamping application to improve quality, profitability, and worker satisfaction.

An OnRobot RG6 gripper and Universal Robots UR3 cobot handle dozens of part sizes and sets up Tomenson for automation in potential applications such as machine tending, deburring, and packaging.

Results “The biggest difference since we brought in automation and the gripper was that we’ve seen a huge reduction in misloads,” said Zach Roake, quality and post-production manager at Tomenson “I would say we’ve seen about a 40% reduction in misloads coming from engraving the wrong side or in the wrong direction since we’ve incorporated the system.”

Profit margins have also improved, especially on smaller products. “Before this system and the gripper, we definitely had lower profit margins on these small blocks,” said Alex Roake. “Now when

Case Study Breakdown Company

Chicago

Industry

Manufacturing

Challenges Gripper Cobot Task Value Drivers

ROI

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we see a small block, we’re not afraid to quote it because we know handling thousands and thousands of these will be done by the robot, not a human, which makes us less fearful of quoting very high-volume small parts.”

“By easily automating the small parts with the gripper and robot, we’re able to save engineering hours while also reallocating workers to focus on bigger parts with complex processes and longer cycles that require more attention.”

The easy programming and implementation of the RG6 gripper has allowed for fast response to customer needs. “Say it’s a Thursday and we get

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Improving pin stamping process OnRobot RG6 Universal Robots UR3 Machine tending Flexible, collaborative, easy programming 40% reduction in misloads; increased profits; improved employee satisfaction 13 Months

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Case Study OnRobot RG6 Gripper Specs Payload Force Fit

13.2 lb

Payload Form Fit

22.04 lb

Gripping Force

25 N to 120 N

Gripping Stroke

Up to 160 mm

Gripping Speed

160 mm/s

Dimensions

10.3 x 8.3 x 1.6 inches

Weight

2.76 lb

Motor

Integrated, electric BLDC

IP Classifiation

54

Compatiblity

Universal Robots, KUKA, Kawasaki, FANUC, Techman, Doosan, NACHI and Yaskawa

a hot order,” said Rose. “We’ll get the job set up and it’ll be on the saw, and on Friday I can have second shift run the robot, just loading and unloading it.

By Monday, we’re already shipping the parts to the customer. It gives us a lot of flexibility to respond to market demands and on-time deliveries, as well as just ease-of-use around the shop.”

Tomenson expects a fast return on its investment by replacing a first-shift operator with the robot and gripper, estimating 13-month return on the gripper for a single shift. Alex added, “If we’re calculating the fact that we can now run our gripper on first and second shift, the number would be roughly half— so around six to seven months we will get our return on investment.”

An additional benefit is increased employee satisfaction and excitement about the new technologies across the company. The process before automation was a human operator loading the pin stamp machine one part at a time, standing or sitting at a stool, and using a foot pedal to activate the pin stamp, all day long.

With the repetitive operation automated and staff moved to more valuable tasks, Tomenson also saw savings in where operators need to be deployed. “Now we load a conveyor that can run for around 45 minutes, and then just keep continuously loading and unloading the conveyor,” said Alex Roake. “Since we are able to let it run unattended for around 45 minutes, we’re

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able to use the same person to run the line saw and the robot, as opposed to having two separate people. In terms of cost savings, it’s basically equivalent to one operator.”

Tomenson is looking at other opportunities for collaborative automation. “Now that we have a successful application with the OnRobot RG6 gripper, we have looked into other possibilities in post-production or shipping or even loading up the CNC machines,” said Alex Roake. “The ease of programming is what leads us to be confident in this decision that we can carry over to other departments, because we don’t need to hire an extra programmer, but can use our existing workforce.” RR

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Case Study

Force torque sensor shines in robotic glass polishing Steve Crowe • Editor • The Robot Report

Saint-Gobain’s plant in Sully-sur-Loire, France, focuses on glass production for the military and aeronautical industries, as well as civilian markets. It was founded in 1665 under King Louis XIV’s reign. Now a global company, it employs more than 185,000 people worldwide.

Near its original headquarters in the outskirts of Paris, human labor provides high-value work to the finished product, but some tasks are more tedious than others. This is why the Sully-sur-Loire factory, like many other Saint-Gobain plants, began to deploy collaborative robot cells into their process.

Challenge Saint-Gobain has a two-step process to finish its products. The first step is polishing, which was done manually with an orbital polisher. Then there is the surface preparation of the glass. Freeing employees om these grueling tasks begins with finding a technology that would do the job on their behalf.

Saint-Gobain’s digital manufacturing manager, Ignacio Sanchez, had to find a solution for a difficult glass polishing process. The operation is painful, equently causing musculoskeletal disorders for workers.

“The operator had to polish all of the glass surface, repeating the same movement on and on,” Sanchez explained. “He then does the surface preparation of the glass before it becomes one of many layers of an armoured glass. This second step is a lot easier. We wanted an automated solution for the polishing part of the process.”

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Solution Saint-Gobain turned to local automation specialist HMI-MBS for help. “Saint-Gobain’s application had a very important diversity of reference points,” said HMI-MBS commercial director Nicolas Bouhet. “There was also a problem of production space, since the cell had to be deployed in a small area in order to work in collaboration with the operators.”

Due to the small space and safety requirements, a Universal Robots UR10 collaborative robot arm was selected. HMI-MBS performed many tests at its lab, but the first proof of concept did not deliver viable options.

“We ended up in a dead end,” recalled Bouhet. “Then we had the idea to use Robotiq’s ​FT 300 force torque sensor with the path recording function. We managed to integrate it into the robot and continued with tests at our offices. We then moved to Saint-Gobain and worked with the operator​ ​to​ ​see​ ​if​ ​the​ ​product​ ​met​ ​ Saint-Gobain’s​ ​expectations.”

The human operator can move the robot and manually make movements he or she wants the robot to perform. With the FT 300, the robot then records and reproduces the operator’s motions.

Testing at HMI-MBS helped minimize the time needed to implement the robot into production. When

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Case Study Breakdown Company

Saint-Gobain

Location

Sully-sur-Loire, France

Industry

Manufacturing

Challenges Force Torque Sensor Cobot Task Value Drivers Results ROI

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Workforce injuries; productivity Robotiq FT 300 Universal Robots UR10 Polishing glass Path recording, collaborative Lowered injuries; increased production 30% < 1 year

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Case Study

everything was ready, the UR10 and FT 300 combo took part of the work over from the operator, and both started working together.

“Without the FT 300, this operation would have been quite complex since the programming of a robot movement that must follow a volume in space is a complicated thing to do,” added Bouhet.

“With the p ​ ath recording function of the FT 300, the operator can grab the device and make the movement; the Universal Robots UR10 then records and reproduces​ ​the​ ​operator’s​ ​motion.”

For Christophe Legeay, methods technician at Saint-Gobain Sully-surLoire, automating the polishing process of each layer of armoured glass gave relief to operators who were previously assigned to this task. “It allowed them to no longer experience vibrations in their shoulders or perform repetitive movements.​ ​The​ ​installation​ ​of​ ​the​ ​robot​ ​ was​ ​more​ ​than​ ​welcome,”​ ​he​ ​explained.

Results Now all the operator has to do in the polishing process is program the proper path for the product and set the glass for polishing. “The robot asks us to place reference marks to check the positioning,” said Sanchez. “You cannot run your application until you have validated your positions. As soon as the validation is done, you press​ ​start​ ​and​ ​the​ ​robot​ ​starts​ ​ running.”

While polishing is in progress, the operator simultaneously washes the glass

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that was previously polished. Then it’s time for surface preparation, a process in which human labor brings much more value into the product.

“We assigned the robot to the hardest part of the polishing process,” said Sanchez. “During this time, the operator can focus on surface preparation. We’re able to produce the same amount of work in​ ​two​ ​8-hour​ ​shifts​ ​instead​ ​of​ ​three,​ ​ before​ ​the​ ​robot​ ​arrived.​ ​We’ve​ ​achieved​ ​ ROI​ ​in​ ​less​ ​than​ ​a​ ​year.”

The company increased its capacity by 30% and was able to deliver​​orders​​on​​top​​ of​ ​those​ ​initially​ ​scheduled.​ ​ “A product​ ​might​ ​come​ ​back​ ​once​ ​ every​ ​one​ ​or​ ​two​ ​years.​ ​We​ ​often​ ​have​ ​to​ ​ create​ ​a​ ​new​ ​program,” said Sanchez. “​By empowering​ ​the​ ​operator,​ ​allowing​ ​him​ ​to​ ​ do​ ​the​ ​program​ ​himself,​ ​we​ ​avoid​ ​calling​ ​ an​ ​integrator​ ​every time​ ​a​ ​product​ ​comes​ ​ back​ ​into​ ​production.​ ​This​ ​is​ ​one​ ​of​ ​the​ ​ goals​ ​of​ ​our​ ​digital​ ​manufacturing​ ​project,​ ​ in which​ ​cobots​ ​will​ ​play​ ​a​ ​huge​ ​role.”

In​ ​a​ ​factory​ ​where​ ​human​ ​labor​ ​ delivering​ ​high-end​ ​quality​ ​has​ ​been​ ​a​ ​ tradition​ ​over​ ​the​ ​last​ ​350​ ​years, robots​ ​ are​ ​now​ ​a​ ​helping​ ​hand​ ​for​ ​human​ ​workers​ ​ aiming​ ​for​ ​perfection.​ ​ “We​ ​do​ ​not​ ​cut​ ​jobs​ ​like​ ​it’s often​ ​ perceived​ ​when​ ​a​ ​robot​ ​is​ ​installed​ ​ somewhere,”​ ​said​ ​Sanchez.​ ​“It’s​ ​a​ ​ collaboration​ ​between man​ ​and​ ​machine​ ​ that​ ​allows​ ​us​ ​to​ ​remove​ ​grueling​ ​tasks​ ​ from​ ​the​ ​hands​ ​of​ ​operators.​ ​This​ ​is​ ​the​ ​ goal and​ ​it’s​ ​fairly​ ​well​ ​perceived​ ​here.” RR

www.therobotreport.com

In​ ​a​ ​factory​ ​where​ ​ human​ ​labor​ ​ delivering​ ​high-end​ ​ quality​ ​has​ ​been​ ​a​ ​ tradition​ ​over​ ​the​ ​last​ ​ 350​ ​years, robots​ ​are​ ​ now​ ​a​ ​helping​ ​hand​ ​ for​ ​human​ ​workers​ ​ aiming​ ​for​ ​perfection.​

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Sensors such as the cameras in this workcell are allowing for more collaborative applications. | Robotiq

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Four trends

in end-of-arm tooling New options and sensors are widening manufacturing applications for cobots.

Steve Crowe and Eugene Demaitre • Editors • The Robot Report

Although evolution in industrial and collaborative robot arms has been slow and steady, progress has been more rapid in grasping.

This is partly driven by the need for dexterous manipulation in pick-and-place operations such as e-commerce order fulfillment.

To understand current trends in end-of-arm tooling (EOAT), The Robot Report spoke with Dan O’Brien, president of Gibson Engineering, as well as Jean-Philippe Jobin, co-founder and chief technology officer at Robotiq, and Sam Bouchard, president of Robotiq.

1 Gripper options grow for collaborative applications The collaborative robotics market slowed last year because of a dip in automotive manufacturing, but most industry analysts expect it to continue to grow. The proliferation of predesigned EOAT such as parallel and so grippers or vacuum cups has accelerated adoption, noted O’Brien.

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The Robot Report 1 “Kristian Hulgard, [general manager, Americas, at OnRobot], recently told me of their plans to introduce between 20 and 30 separate new products this year,” he said. “That, along with their quick-change technology, should open up the number and types of applications that can be accomplished, along with speeding the time it takes to go from one application to the next. They really want to move the discussion from collaborative robots to collaborative applications.”

Robotiq is also well-known for its grippers, and it isn’t sitting on its laurels, either. Jobin said he expects the Quebecbased company to continue developing tools that help companies complete manufacturing tasks with cobots.

“There’s no reason why Robotiq would stop developing new tools,” he said. “It’s been one good aspect of the business that we’ve been recognized for grippers.

Now we don’t want to be recognized just for that - we want to be recognized for everything we can bring around the application.”

Robotiq is not just selling its grippers and end-of-arm-tools for cobots, but it’s also bundling different parts to build solutions for specific tasks. Last year, the company announced cobot application

Jean-Philippe Jobin, co-founder and CTO of Robotiq, announces new products at the gripper maker’s annual user conference. | Robotiq

kits and new learning platforms for customers and partners as a way to help companies “start production faster” in manufacturing environments.

“By taking the application first and bundling them together, I think we can simplify things at a certain level,” said Jobin. “The final goal is if we’re able to put things together and have them talk together, we would like the complexity to stay beneath, and only show the customer a ‘lever’ to make it work. The end user doesn’t care about the camera; they don’t care about the robot; they just want to do a task.”

2

OnRobot has a unified mechanical and electrical interface for its products.

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| OnRobot

www.therobotreport.com

2 EOAT suppliers go vendor-agnostic Many EOAT providers focused on being compatible with only one brand of robot, observed O’Brien. As the early market leader in collaborative robot arms, Universal Robots was an obvious choice.

However, that has changed. “Based on the speed with which new players are entering the cobot market, it’s now standard practice to support multiple robot brands with their new designs,” O’Brien said. “OnRobot currently supports eight brands and plans to continue adding to that as new cobots enter the market.”

One reason for Robotiq’s goal of simplifying the process of installing a cobot application into a production workflow is because of a continued lack of skilled workers.

“In order to make the production, the end users don’t have enough people in order to do the manual task, so they want to automate,” said Jobin. “But on the other side, it’s even more difficult to find skilled people in order to put in production robots. So we are trying to solve those two aspects at the same time in that phase, creating products that could automate the task, and then on the other side, trying to automate the automation.”

3 Safety moves to the end of the arm Cobot arms may be rated for hand guiding, power and force limiting, safetyrated monitored stopping, and speed and separation monitoring. But most vendors will remind you that a safety assessment is still necessary to evaluate the tooling, payload, and operating environment.

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Assemble with performance materials The AIRSKIN Module Pads add collaborative features to robots such as the Mitsubishi RV series. | Blue Danube

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Improvements in sensors, computer vision, and connectivity are helping cobots be safer, which is especially important for emerging mobile manipulation. With sensing technology such as that from Veo Robotics, “collaborative” could become more of a property of industrial robots than a standalone category.

“After a recent meeting with Johannes Marktl, [head of sales at] Blue Danube Robotics, I was impressed to see that they’d extended their AIRSKIN technology to include the end-of-arm tooling,” said O’Brien. “AIRSKIN mounts like an outer layer to robots and/or tooling, and it senses a collision in real time and sends a signal to the robot safety circuit.”

“This allows for more traditional robots like the Mitsubishi RV series to work safely around people, and it allows the end-of-arm tooling to be part of a safe collaborative application,” he continued. “Blue Danube has also introduced AIRSKIN Module Pads, which

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is a cost-effective way to quickly and easily add safety to moving machinery, cartesian systems and custom end-ofarm tools.”

More and better sensors, in combination with EOAT, can also improve productivity.

“We have a team continuing to look at vision, to see where it’s going,” said Jobin.

“We believe in force-torque sensing and tactile sensing. We did develop technologies related to tactile sensing.

“Four years ago, we had some samples and tactile sensors in order to recognize a part, but it was not good enough in order to make a product, so we continue developing that.”

“Port placement is an important issue right now for our partners, so how can we solve that? There are many companies doing things such as intelligent trays and feeders, so the question is how would such a product be if a robot was doing that?” he asked. “Feeding the parts through a robot is sometimes in some

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The Robot Report application as important as picking the part and placing it in the machine because of the complexity of the input and the output.”

4 New applications a ‘piece of cake’ New grippers, wider interoperability, and improved safety all enable cobot end users to apply automation to even more tasks, across industries.

“I remember the first robots we sold back in the mid-1990s,” recalled O’Brien.

“IAI had introduced some low-cost SCARA robots, and we had visions of high-tech applications in factories.”

“It was eye-opening that the first robots we sold were installed in a bakery to grease cake pans,” he said. “It turned out that the operators who were doing that job didn’t love it, and they’d occasionally let a pan get through that wasn’t completely greased. When that happened, the bakery would bake the cake, but then it would be destroyed while they were getting it out of the pan.”

“It turned out that robots could do the task repeatably, ending the problem of the wasted cakes,” O’Brien said. “Back in those days, the robots had to be in cages, and typically you needed engineering to get a system up and running. With today’s robot and end-ofarm tooling options, the number and type of applications we can solve has dramatically increased, while the engineering Samuel Bouchard, co-founder and CEO of Robotiq

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and design overhead has been greatly reduced, along with the time to deployment.”

A related challenge facing manufacturers looking to automate is determining whether an application is good or bad for robots to handle.

“The trap there is that things that are so easy for humans are extremely difficult for robots, and vice versa,” said Bouchard.

“That’s why sometimes if you’re new to robotics, it’s really hard to evaluate the complexity [of an application]. That’s where the knowledge of our team and partner network is very important.”

Bouchard said he advises partners to go to factories to see all of the applications and find out what the end user wants to automate. “If you see that it’s too complex because you know the complexity of robotics, make them understand that they should be targeting a simpler application,” he said.

“We have some guidelines and documents explaining the process, the parts, the parts presentation on the cycle time, etc.,” Bouchard added. “These are rough guidelines, but one of the challenges in this industry is that it’s hard to systemize all the learning, experience and tacit knowledge that adds a lot of value. That’s why once you’ve seen a lot of different projects, you can explain and really guide the partners in that direction.” RR

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