The vision-guided robot is a turnkey inspection system that provides final quality verification of large components such as automotive engines or large electronic parts where the component or part inspection is performed in three dimensions. The solution combines easy-to-use machine vision components with robotics, which easily solves complicated inspections to be performed by manufacturers.
To perform quality inspections of large parts, multiple machine vision cameras are required because the component may be too large for the number of pixels available on the machine vision sensor, and to capture all the features of the parts and complete them in one image. Therefore, this type of verification is not automated because of the excessive equipment, assembly space, and complex setup of all the necessary tooling. But this is where robotics, such as the UR5 arm, excels in simplifying all the equipment into a single automation solution. The UR5 system uses camera vision in a dynamic application, where the robot and camera communicate data in order to move to the necessary inspection points on all component parts.
In Cross Company’s UR5 robotic inspection system the locations for inspection of a component are communicated by a SKU, which is read through a component, and enters the inspection point on the manufacturing line.
This SKU initiates a machine vision job on the intelligent Vision HAWK camera containing all the prescribed inspection steps for that component. As the UR5 robotic arm moves to the correct position, a command is sent to the Vision HAWK camera so that a correct verification can be performed. The system tracks the cumulative results of all inspections and a quality data report is generated for the component.
Microscan Vision’s HAWK Smart Camera was selected for Cross Company’s UR5 inspection because of its fully integrated design, which brings together powerful verification tools, image processing, advanced optics, autofocus lenses, and LED lighting, all within a compact industrial machine vision camera. The camera is easily integrated into equipment via RS-232 or Ethernet connections and can communicate via Ethernet TCP/IP, EtherNet/IP™, and PROFINET protocols using the Microscan Link industrial connectivity tool, available on all Microscan machine vision systems.