Polishing with Speed and Consistency – Motoman Robots

Pol­ish­ing is a fin­ish­ing process that is per­formed after mate­r­i­al removal process­es to even out the sur­face of the part or prod­uct. Man­u­fac­tur­ers are switch­ing to auto­mat­ed pol­ish­ing robots, like those avail­able through Motoman Robot­ics, to improve the pol­ish­ing process. Motoman has devel­oped a line of robots that are able to per­form the pol­ish­ing process with the speed and con­sis­ten­cy to keep man­u­fac­tur­ers com­pet­i­tive in the con­stant­ly chang­ing marketplace.

While human work­ers are able to pol­ish parts, the rapid­ly chang­ing require­ments and needs of the met­al fin­ish­ing indus­try is not served well by man­u­al appli­ca­tions. Accord­ing to an arti­cle in the Inter­na­tion­al Jour­nal of Advanced Man­u­fac­tur­ing Tech­nol­o­gy, the ratio of the fin­ish­ing process time to the whole process time is increased, as well as hav­ing an increase in the demand for sur­face qual­i­ty. This ren­ders man­u­al pol­ish­ing almost obso­lete, espe­cial­ly in com­pa­nies that run high­er vol­umes. Robot­ic pol­ish­ing, like the appli­ca­tions per­formed by Motoman robots, has a high­er lev­el of flex­i­bil­i­ty and a low­er cost overall. 

A Motoman robot­ic pol­ish­er deliv­ers con­sis­tent pol­ish­ing over the entire part, leav­ing the part with a gleam­ing, even fin­ish, which improves the over­all aes­thet­ic of the part. With a Motoman robot pol­ish­ing sys­tem, speed is also con­sis­tent, and more parts can be pol­ished suc­cess­ful­ly in a day, with­out hav­ing to sac­ri­fice their qual­i­ty. This allows man­u­fac­tur­ers to fin­ish part orders more quick­ly and expand their busi­ness over time. Also, man­u­fac­tur­ers are able to com­bine up to four robots in a work­cell, two manip­u­lat­ing parts and two pol­ish­ing parts, for ulti­mate flex­i­bil­i­ty and speed.

Also, pol­ish­ing and fin­ish­ing appli­ca­tions can fre­quent­ly have small­er parts, which can be hard to han­dle. Motoman has a wide vari­ety of pol­ish­ing end-of-arm tool­ing that can pol­ish any­thing from a large car work piece to the small­est of work pieces for the elec­tron­ics indus­try. Motoman also offers a MotoGrind robot grind­ing and pol­ish­ing turnkey sys­tem that allows for more con­sis­tent pol­ish­ing of parts that have com­pli­cat­ed shapes. This sys­tem incor­po­rates a laser scan­ner and spe­cial­ized Motoman soft­ware into the appli­ca­tion process to get an even pol­ish on the more com­plex parts.

Motoman rec­om­mends the MH series of robots for pol­ish­ing appli­ca­tions, because of their high lev­el of per­for­mance and dura­bil­i­ty. This fast mov­ing series of robots, which fea­tures the MH215 and MH50, are built with high-dura­bil­i­ty dri­ve units and high moment and iner­tia rat­ings, which allow them to glide smooth­ly through their application. 

Are you inter­est­ed in learn­ing more about Motoman pol­ish­ing robots or not sure what type of pol­ish­ing appli­ca­tor or tool­ing is right for your prod­uct or robot? The Robots​.com staff will work with you to help select the right robot sys­tem, tool­ing or appli­ca­tor for your project. 

For more infor­ma­tion, con­tact Robots​.com today online or at 877−762−6881.