Automated Machine Vision

Once they were blind, but now they can see. Increased accu­ra­cy of vision guid­ance sys­tems ensures increased robot­ic accu­ra­cy. While vision doesn’t make robots self-aware, it gives them the abil­i­ty to locate parts to be picked up, deter­mine where to apply a weld, inspect assem­bled parts, and deter­mine where to place a part.

Cam­eras are becom­ing more pow­er­ful and accu­rate in indus­tri­al robot­ics. More sin­gle cam­era 3‑D sys­tems are avail­able, which is a per­fect match for robots oper­at­ing with­in six degrees of free­dom. Robot-mount­ed cam­eras gen­er­ate images to refine an object’s posi­tion through tri­an­gu­la­tion, ensur­ing high accuracy.

With cam­eras that alle­vi­ate light­ing issues, along with more accu­rate soft­ware and more rugged equip­ment, vision guid­ance sys­tems are becom­ing more robust and powerful.

Stereo­scop­ic vision guid­ance pro­vides sys­tems that are capa­ble of locat­ing objects as well as track­ing and pre­dict­ing their loca­tion in motion. Res­o­lu­tion and accu­ra­cy have improved in the stereo­scop­ic sys­tems, and they no longer require calibration.

Almost every appli­ca­tion now relies on machine vision. As robot­ic vision guid­ance becomes more accu­rate, it facil­i­tates more pre­cise weld­ing process­es. Typ­i­cal weld­ing appli­ca­tions require accu­ra­cy to with­in a mil­lime­ter, and this is achiev­able with machine vision. Even for appli­ca­tions requir­ing near-per­fect weld­ing such as air­craft welds, the soft­ware can run a weld­ing bead to with­in 10 microns.

Assem­bly appli­ca­tions allow enhance­ments to robot­ic vision guid­ance on the micro and nano-lev­els. Machine vision can locate minis­cule objects and zoom to val­i­date posi­tions. Res­o­lu­tion goes to the micron range. The vision guid­ance sys­tem must have a high res­o­lu­tion to ensure the robot cho­sen for micro-assem­bly appli­ca­tions has repeata­bil­i­ty and accuracy.

The robot must be cal­i­brat­ed with the vision guid­ance sys­tem to main­tain prop­er posi­tion­ing when the robot per­forms its tasks. The robot must under­stand what the vision cam­era sees. End-users must recal­i­brate the vision sys­tem occa­sion­al­ly when the focus is changed. 

Prop­er light­ing is crit­i­cal for vision for func­tion con­sis­tent­ly and to report part posi­tion to the robot. Lights should be arranged to cast dif­fused light instead of direct light when set­ting up a robot­ic guid­ance vision sys­tem. Struc­tured LED light­ing in robot­ic machine vision appli­ca­tions ben­e­fits the user by low­er­ing costs and min­i­miz­ing effects of incon­sis­tent lighting. 

Fanuc’s engi­neers are ded­i­cat­ed to devel­op­ing inte­gral robot­ic vision prod­ucts, pro­vid­ing a top lev­el of per­for­mance and reli­a­bil­i­ty. Fanuc’s iRVi­sion offers sev­er­al products: 

• 2D Vision guid­ance accu­rate­ly moves the robot to the loca­tion of the part with­out the need for expen­sive posi­tion­ing fixtures. 
• 3DL Vision guid­ance pro­vides the abil­i­ty to quick­ly find parts posi­tion (X,Y,Z) and ori­en­ta­tion (W,P,R).
• Visu­al Line Track­ing pro­vides the abil­i­ty to pick prod­ucts from a mov­ing conveyor. 
• Vision Guid­ed De-pal­letiz­ing allows for the 2D cam­era sys­tem to lever­age the size of parts to deter­mine the depth of parts.

Motoman offers Moto­Sight 2D, ide­al­ly suit­ed for robot guid­ance, error proof­ing, part iden­ti­fi­ca­tion and inspec­tion, and high-speed pick­ing. Moto­Sight 2D with MotoPick locates ran­dom­ly ori­ent­ed prod­ucts on a mov­ing con­vey­or belt. Moto­Sight 3D Cor­texVi­sion sim­pli­fies the use of 3D vision in robot­ic guid­ance appli­ca­tions, idea for pre­cise part loca­tion, rack­ing, dis­pens­ing, machine load­ing, prod­uct sort­ing, and weld­ing. Moto­Sight 3D Spa­tial Vision deliv­ers scal­able 3D vision guid­ance for six degrees of posi­tion and pose information.

Robots​.com can help you inte­grate a vision machine sys­tem into your facil­i­ty. Con­tact us to learn more online or at 877−762−6881.