Keeping It Closed – Hard Stop and Interlocking Door Safety Features
Any robotic work cell should be properly equipped with safety systems. For instance, the incorporation of hard stop and interlocking door safety features on your workcell will ensure that workers are kept out during operation. Contact Robots.com representatives today to figure out the best safety features for integration onto your automation system.
A safety interlocking system is important for any robotic work cell. By incorporating hard stop and interlocking door safety features into your work cell, you are ensuring that no worker is going into the robot’s area when the robot is in operation. This, along with proper training, will keep your workers safe and free from robot-related injuries.
So, what are these features? A hard stop feature is made up of a zone ring and two zone switches. This zone ring is attached to the base of the robot and has two zone switches connected to it, one on either side of the robot. These features are connected to the base of the robot so that the switches can communicate to other areas of a work cell, like the doors, when a robot is in operation.
Basically, if a robot is moving without being in teach mode (and without someone holding the teach pendant), a human cannot be in their space. For example, if a robot is in zone A and it has to move to zone B to work on a project, but a human is in zone B, there are safety measures in place to ensure that the robot cannot move into that area. The hard stop feature is what makes the robot stop when the interlocking doors are opened.
But, what are interlocking doors, you ask? That is simple. Interlocking doors are doors that have switches that channel back to the zone switches on the robot. The zone switches control zone A or zone B. Before the robot can move to zone A, the interlocking door for zone A needs to be closed. If the interlocking door for zone A is opened at any time while the robot is performing its application, the robot will perform a hard stop. In order for the safety violation to be fixed, the door must be closed. Then, the technician needs to reset the robot, and it will be safe to resume operations again.
For more information on interlocking doors, hard stops or any other safety features for your robots or work cells, call Robots.com today online or at 877-762-6881.
Related Articles
You might be also interested in:
- Safety & Regulations
Top Reasons to Automate Your Foundry with Robotics
Foundry robots excel in harsh environments bringing their power, safety, increased savings, accuracy, and flexibility. Foundry robots have an IP 67 rating and can endure harsh conditions with ease and work without fatigue. They can also handle heavy payloads and reduce the injuries of human workers by taking care of the repetitive and back breaking labor.
- Safety & Regulations
Building an Effective Welding Cell: A How-To Guide
It is important to plan a welding workcell out to optimize your production line. You must consider a positioner, safety package, and other key elements in order to complete the perfect welding cell.
- Safety & Regulations
Collaborative Robot Safety
Collaborative robots are becoming more enticing to manufacturers as they the perfect bridge for manual work and automation. These collaborative robots provide increased productivity and added value while also being incredibly safe. There are a variety of factors that help provide a safe environment for the workers who interact with them such as vision and sensors.
- Safety & Regulations
International Robot Safety Conference
The International Robot Safety Conference (IRSC) dives deeper into robotic safety and industrial machine and robot standards. Robots.com sends a few employees to attend the conference and stay up to date on all of the trending safety issues. The IRSC helps people from all different applications and backgrounds to stay safe and competitive in the automation world.
- Safety & Regulations
Innovative Safety Solutions with ABB's SafeMove2
ABB has provided customers with an updated software solution titled SafeMove2. SafeMove2 will increase the flexibility, greater space savings, numerous cutting edge commissioning tools, and improved safety functions. The safety function of SafeMove2 include safe speed limits, standstill monitoring, axis ranges and position, and orientation supervision. This helps to decrease the overall need for fences and cages.
- Safety & Regulations
Tool Changers Provide Strength, Safety, and Effectiveness
If your industrial line requires a tool change during your manufacturing process, than you may want to consider a robotic tool changer. A robot tool changer provides flexibility for automation processes to automatically change tools, end-effectors, or other secondary tooling quickly and effectively. ATI Industrial Automation is an industrial leader in robotic end-effectors and robot arm tooling. They have created a Robotic Tool Changer that is a coupling device that locks and unlocks pneumatically.
Let's talk!
Request your quick quote today.