Article Index
TOP 5 IN 2010: Automation technologies to watch for
Jim Pinto
Eric Byres
Marc Ostertag
Anders Lif
Sal Spada
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Jim Pinto

Sal Spada

• Sal Spada is a senior analyst with the ARC Advisory Group. His focus areas include motion control, material handling, machine safeguarding, robotics, servo drives, and packaging machinery and operations.

1. Adaptive production machinery.
In practice, there are innumerable process issue considerations to take into account when seeking to implement a solution. The complexity of the process is the primary reason major CNC suppliers won’t get directly involved with adaptive machining solutions. The issues with regard to tooling include tooling profile, tooling coatings, tooling variation, work piece material, work piece material variation, machine tool characteristics and surface finish quality. These process variables are not an area of expertise for the CNC suppliers, so major CNC suppliers do not want to get engaged directly with the end-use manufacturer.

2. Design tools integrated with automation for mechatronic optimization.
Mechatronic support services include comprehensive simulation tools for testing primary as well as alternative machine concepts. Such tools create a virtual machine environment to test a prototype and production machine performance. In this phase, machine builders can run tests for machine cycles, sectional speed capabilities, bottlenecks and safety. As a result, machine builders can modify or configure machines for optimum performance and high productivity. Mechatronic support services can not only eliminate the need for building multiple physical machines prior to production, but can also speed actual machine deployment.

3. Robotic safeguarding solutions.
Robotic suppliers are introducing innovative solutions that provide protection from the inside out rather than the pervasive outside-looking-in approach. These innovations are based on the concept of “work envelope limitations,” which is more akin to a designed-in safety approach, than an add-on safety approach. A designed-in safety approach provides an opportunity to improve the productivity of the work cell by constraining the movement of the robotic arm based on the location of the production worker and the perimeter fencing.

4. Sensor networks become viable options.
IO-Link is a low-cost, point-to-point wired sensor network that offers improvements in deployment, continuous operation, and diagnostics for the most widely used types of sensors. An IO-Link sensor transmits standard digital or analog output signals and provides additional serial data communications with the control unit as master to exchange parameters such as the measuring range, sensitivity, time delay and operating mode. Because the serial data transmission needs no additional wires and the output signals are compatible, it is possible to use standard cables and connectors and combine or mix IO-Link devices with standard devices.

5. Motion control safety functionality improves machine utilization.
Integrating safety functionality into servo drives and other motion control equipment is one of the most intriguing drivers in the machine safeguarding market. Embedding a safety controller and safe I/O right into a servo drive eliminates the need for a separate safety controller and I/O. Safety functions are integrated directly into the drive, eliminating the need for external power contactors and speed monitoring equipment and enabling local control. Many view this trend not as a threat the machine safeguarding market, but as a move toward incorporating increasingly more safety functions in machinery.

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